Phoenix
by Murph the 2nd
Summary: Like the legend of the Phoenix, all ends with beginnings. With the other starters gone and only a freshly born Larvesta left for him, will Ash succumb to a vastly more powerful world, or will he conquer it, to rise amongst the stars a legend? NOT overpowered Ash. Crossover of sorts between the anime and the games.
1. Part 1 - Episode 1

_Edit: Due to an earlier draft of the story featuring a male Shedinja instead of a female Larvesta, it still referred to her as a him several times. Thanks to ews1 for pointing it out._

 _Second Edit: Moved the A/N in the middle of the chapter to the end notes. Thanks to Mateusz - and apologies if I butcher your name - for pointing it out._

 _Third Edit (and I'm making way too many of these): Replaced the cars and buses mentioned in all of a single paragraph with 'faster land-bound Pokémon' and Mantines - as in, there's Mantine lines instead of Bus lines. Nothing important, really._

* * *

 _ **A/N: A little warning: this is going to be darker than the Anime, not that that's saying much. Death is pretty common in the wild, just like IRL, and sometimes, people die at the hands of enraged/out of control/antagonistic creatures, just like IRL, only with the Pokémon being bears and wolves instead. There'll be a criminal underworld, Team Rocket/Aqua/Magma/etc. will actually have their – usually broken – Pokémon kill people, just like RL gangs sometimes do, and sometimes, even good guys have to kill a bad guy.**_

 _ **If you're becoming queasy about the prospect of so much death, don't be. If you've read Traveller – which, if you haven't, you really should – then you'll notice that the above all happened there, too. It doesn't mean that the whole world is hell, like in Sun Soul, and there'll be tons of people dying left and right, and nuclear warfare, and massacred cities, and – no. Just like in Traveller, there'll be a death here and there, but not a lot.**_

 _ **It's just a fair warning to those of us that want Pokémon to be unicorns barfing up rainbows and happy innocent children putting their fingers up their noses and coming back with pots of gold.**_

 _ **Needless to say, this won't be that kind of story.**_

 _ **-The Baron**_

* * *

 **Part 1: Birth**

 **Episode 1: Spinning Wheel**

" _The death of fire is the birth of air, and the death of air is the birth of water.  
This world, which is the same for all, no one of gods or men has made. But it always was and will be:  
an ever-living fire, with measures of it kindling, and measures going out."  
– Heraclitus, Hodos Ano Kato, circa 500 B.C._

Every story has a protagonist.

Usually, said protagonist is the hero. The one that does what is 'good'. What is considered 'right', and 'just'. Sometimes, they're the anti-hero, with a general lack of morals and oftentimes merely looking for the means to an end, willing to use whatever they can get their hands on to reach their goal. Other times, they're downright evil, and have the goal of anything from killing an enemy to ending the world – but that's another matter entirely.

The point is, every story has a protagonist, but they all come in different shapes and sizes, from being a literal saint to being Satan's personification on the earthly plane, with all the horns and tridents that come with the job. A child of a god, Fate's toy, the bringer of the apocalypse, even apocalypse themselves – there are plenty of examples, but only one is important.

The important one is, of course, the perfectly ordinary people, the people who only become great by the things that accompany them on the grand adventure of life; the so-called mutants, made to be the way they are by their surroundings instead of their inherent self. These people are often influenced by the very smallest of changes, from a loose bolt in a chair to someone stumbling along and finding out a secret they shouldn't have.

In one universe, Ash was destined to receive an incredibly powerful Pikachu as his starter who, even though he wouldn't listen in the first few days, would quickly become his best friend, carrying him through practically every battle with ease but always dropping the ball when it was most needed. But in another universe entirely, the Pikachu hadn't made it to Oak's Corral soon enough to get scooped up by Ash, which instead forced the Professor to find a different solution entirely to his lack of starter Pokémon to hand out.

Enter Larvesta.

Oo0oO

"So this is it?" Ash asked curiously, crouching down near the Bug-type, who was peering around curiously. "The Larvae, or whatever?"

Professor Oak snorted, rummaging through his drawers to look for a backup Pokédex. "Larvesta, Ash. They're a rare Bug- and Fire-type from the Unova region. Professor Juniper sent a few eggs over from a Volcarona nest a research crew discovered deep in an ancient underground castle, for research into the species. It's fascinating, really, that such a powerful Pokémon could survive in such remote circumstances and have enough strength to lay eggs and get them fertilised – which will, of course, require a male Volcarona to find a female one and fertilise the eggs she'd already laid, unless there happens to be a large population of Ditto nearby, who have been proven to be able to mate with almost any species –" Suddenly, Oak paused, and shook his head. "But I digress entirely, so let's get back to the matter at hand.

"The Larvesta you have there is the first of the eggs to hatch. To be honest, I probably wouldn't have given her to you if I'd have had another Pokémon for you to take, but that's neither here nor there. Ah, here we are." The Professor surfaced again, a small, red device clutched victoriously in his hand.

Ash, meanwhile, blinked. "But – why not? If Volanora is as powerful as you say it is, and Larvesta is its pre-evolution, and you have so many more specimens –"

"Volcarona, Ash." Oak corrected, dumping the Pokédex and a couple of Pokéballs on the table in front of him. "And the only reason I didn't want to give it to you in the first place is because Larvesta are, frankly, a pain to train – not to mention so ludicrously rare that giving one away just seems wrong for whatever reason, and I don't doubt that if Aaron came around, asking for one of the Larvesta to use on his own team after my research into them is done, then I'd still hesitate."

"Why are they such a pain?" Ash asked curiously as he stood up, hugging the fluffy Larvesta, who was purring happily, to him. Oak grinned a little at the sight.

"Well, Larvesta are extremely weak to Rock-types, having an inherently weak body, even weaker than most Bug-types, so you'll have to skip past Pewter to head over to Cerulean for your first gym." Ash frowned at that. "Not to mention that the fastest any Larvesta has been able to evolve under normal conditions – excluding extensive training in a volcano, for example, which always gives any Fire-type a kick in the behind evolution-wise – is over three years." Oak said bluntly, and Ash gaped.

"W-what?"

The Professor nodded. "The theory behind it is pretty complicated, but I'll try to explain the simplest I can." He paused briefly, looking for the right words. "When Pokémon are freshly born, they have little power, and through training and ageing in general, they become more powerful, their bodies able to hold more of this power as it becomes older." Ash nodded, to show that he was following. "A Pokémon that evolves always becomes much more powerful, but if they evolve too early – for example, if you give a fire stone to a Growlithe days after it is born – their bodies might not be able to hold that new power. There had even been a case where a trainer had evolved a Growlithe within days of being born, and it died during evolution." Ash' eyebrows climbed into his hairline. "This is why Dratini only evolves into a Dragonair after around two years, and Dragonair take another year to evolve into a Dragonite – to allow their bodies to slowly grow accustomed to their new power and to make room for even more.

"Volcarona, to put it simply, are stupidly powerful." When Ash didn't seem to grasp what exactly that meant, Oak continued, "Ancient civilisations put them alongside the Legendary Birds and Johto's Beasts, worshipping them as minor deities. They've even been said to having replaced the sun during the times before mankind, when ash from volcanoes blocked out the sky." Ash gaped, and even Larvesta seemed to be able to understand what a big deal that was, tittering anxiously. "Because of this power, their bodies take years upon years to be able to handle it, and as a Bug-type, their unique physiology won't allow them to have more than two evolutions, unless there's a cocoon stage in between, which Volcarona skipped, just like Venomoth, Vespiquen, and most of the other bug-types did, but the exact reasons of that, I'm not going to go into right now.

"The point is, Larvesta is going to be rather weak for the coming few years, but when she does finally evolve – it will definitely be worth it." Oak grinned.

"But –" Ash blinked – "If Volcarona are that powerful, shouldn't there have been at least one of them in the last few years in – well, in any one of the conferences? I mean, I've watched them all, but this is the first time I've heard of one of them."

"Like I said, they're rarer than Pseudo-Legendaries, which is why it was such a big deal when the exploration team found such a large nest." Oak shrugged. "And even if a trainer managed to come across one, there's a large chance that they'll eventually give up on it, simply because for actual teams that compete in the Leagues, anything but fully evolved Pokémon are rather useless, due to the sheer power that's thrown around in competitive rings like it's nothing."

"Well, thanks, Professor." Ash grinned down at Larvesta, who was purring happily. "I really appreciate it. And I certainly won't give up, just because it takes a little longer than otherwise."

Professor Oak's lips twitched up into a fond smile. "Just a small word of advice – Gary picked a Squirtle for his starter, and as Larvesta is a Fire-Bug dual-type that, because of being so young, will probably be unable to do anything but half of an Ember and a String Shot, I would advise against fighting him if you come across him before catching any new Pokémon." Ash nodded, and Oak grinned, nodding at the door. "Now, I believe Delia is waiting for you at home, and she'll want to meet Larvesta – if you wait too long, she might even come over here and take a look herself."

Ash' grin grew. "Of course, Professor. I'll call you when I get to Viridian." He waved as he walked off, leaving Oak to frown about his suddenly cluttered lab.

"Hey, Daisy! Where are you? I need some help here!"

Oo0oO

Larvesta's presence on top of Ash' hat drew quite a few looks as he strolled through Pallet Town towards his and his mother's house, but they were more looks of curiosity – and even awe in the case of young children – rather than fear, which he'd halfway expected due to Larvesta's status as a Bug-type. Instead of shying away from the attention, like he normally would have done, Ash merely let it wash over him, trying to act like he didn't care about the attention that Larvesta – and by proxy Ash – was receiving from everyone, when in fact, it made him feel rather as if he was heading for the slaughterhouse; but nobody seemed to notice that, thankfully enough.

Mere seconds after knocking, the front door to Ash' house swung open, and Delia only took a second to look at Shedinja before jumping forwards with a big smile.

"Oh, he's so cute!" She cried, scooping the small Bug-type off of Ash' head and cuddling it to her chest. At once, Larvesta began buzzing uncomfortably, and wriggled around, trying to get out of Delia's tight grip. Luckily, she seemed to notice that the Fire-type wasn't exactly pleased with the attention, and let her go; Larvesta quickly shuffled back to Ash and hid behind his legs, glaring distrustfully at Delia like she was going to attack at any moment.

"Calm down, Larvesta." Ash tried to sooth his friend. "This is my mother, Delia Ketchum. Mom, this is Larvesta."

"Hello!" Delia smiled brightly and waved a little, and Larvesta let up on her glare now that the weird woman wasn't as close to her, though she still made sure to stay as far away as she could. "What kind of Pokémon is he? I've never seen a Larvesta before, even on TV."

"Larvesta's a she, according to Professor Oak." Ash answered, bringing out his Pokédex from his jacket's pocket. "Hold on, I'll check." He pointed the little device at Larvesta, who was still focused on Ash' mother, and not at all paying attention to what her new trainer was doing. " _Larvesta,_ " The Pokédex began immediately, " _The Torch Pokémon. A Larvesta shoots fire from its five horns to repel its enemies. They live at the base of volcanoes_."

"Basic Fire-type stuff, then." Delia concluded quickly, but Ash shook his head, scrolling down the list of information.

"No. Larvesta is actually a Fire-Bug type, and she's incredibly frail, so I'm probably going to have to skip Brock and head for Cerulean first, because anything that I can catch on the routes to Pewter isn't exactly going to help against Rock-types, either." Ash blinked, suddenly coming across a rather curious entry. "This is interesting. It says here that Larvesta only knows Ember and String Shot, but barely, and Magnet Rise."

In response, Larvesta focused for a brief second, before fire began shooting out of the bottom pair of torches on her head, and she propelled herself a few inches into the air. ***** Ash and Delia both blinked at the unexpected action. "Well," Ash' mother said dryly, "I think that, for once, your habit of sleeping in might have turned out for the better."

Ash pouted.

Suddenly, his mother blinked again, as if suddenly remembering that there was a journey her son was supposed to go on, and grabbed Ash' backpack from where it had been sitting behind the door. "Right! I packed your bag already – it's got everything you should need. Temperature-proof thermos can, filled to the brim with water, a packed lunch for on the road, enough rations for a couple of days, so you can get to Viridian safely, some generic Pokémon food, a map of the region, a fresh change of clothes, a couple of pairs of underwear –"

"I get it, Mom!" Ash flushed, and snagged the bag from his mother's arms. Despite the fact that it was rather early in the morning, quite a few people were out and about already, and a few passers-by sniggered at his humiliation. Larvesta, though not fully understanding of why it was so humiliating, tittered in amusement regardless, and Ash shot her a betrayed look.

Delia smiled fondly at her son, and gave him a hug. "Be safe, Ash. I'm sure you'll go far. Call me when you get to the Pokémon Centre, will you?" She grinned mischievously. "And remember to change your underwear every day! I packed those for a reason, you know."

" _Mom!_ "

Oo0oO

"Finally on the road, huh, Larvesta?" Ash grinned several minutes later, stretching his arms out languidly as he basked in the morning sun shining down on Pallet Woods. Larvesta rumbled contently, eyes closed as she rode along on Ash' hat. Ash grinned up at her, before shoving his arms into his pockets and shuffling onward.

It wasn't a fast pace he was setting, but he wasn't aiming for getting to Viridian in less than a day, like some of the more fanatic trainers were hoping to do. With an entire year until the next Conference, even at the pace he was setting, he could probably do two entire laps of the Gym circuit before hopping over to the Indigo plateau. And speaking of Gyms…

Ash sighed as he took out his Pokédex. Larvesta let out a curious rumble, and peeked over the top of Ash' hat to read along. Ash glanced up at her. "The first Gym trainers from Pallet usually face is the one in Pewter, Brock, because he has a team set aside for people that have no badges, a slightly stronger team for those that have one, even stronger for those that have two, etcetera.

"A lot of Gyms do, really, because otherwise people from for example Fuchsia would have to travel for months before being able to come over to Pewter, just for their first Gym battle. It's only Saffron and Viridian that don't do this, and maybe the guys in the Orange Islands, but nobody's heard from those guys in ages, with the semi-Civil War they've got going on over there. The problem is that you will – excuse the pun – get squashed like a bug by the Pewter Gym." Larvesta tittered a little, likely offended, but Ash shook his head a little.

"It's nothing you can do anything about, it's just a problem with your species. No matter how strong you might get, you won't beat a Rock-type – Pewter's specialty – without having way more experience and quite a few more moves to your arsenal, simply because you'll lose from a single hit. We'll just need new members for the team, ones that can take out Rock-types, and we'll be fine." Seemingly mollified, Larvesta settled calmly again, blinking quietly. Ash smiled, before looking back at his Pokédex.

"Right. So unless we can catch a Pidgey and train it into a Pidgeot to fly us around – which will take months – or we scrounge up enough money to get a ride on a ferry – which, again, will take months – the next Gym on our journey will be Cerulean." Ash scowled. "According to this map, that's an entire month of travel, excluding the time it'll take to navigate through Mount Moon in between Pewter and Cerulean. I knew that it'd be long, but I hadn't expected it to be this damn long. That's stupid."

Larvesta tittered, but Ash glanced up at her, and raised an eyebrow. "I can understand you a little, Larvesta, but it'll take a while before I can make out everything you're saying." Larvesta nodded understandingly, though she still sagged slightly. Ash grinned. "Cheer up, Larvesta! We'll have a good month travelling to Cerulean, and I'll train you up to completely smash those Water-types, type advantage my back door!"

With a blink, the Bug-type rumbled happily, silently already envisioning the ways she would be able to rip apart her enemies after an entire month's worth of training. Completely oblivious to this, Ash went back to Larvesta's entry in his Pokédex, and scanned her potential moveset. He blinked. "This isn't bad, Larvesta. In a few years' time, you might even be able to use moves like Flare Blitz, or even Bug Buzz, which would even be really good for when you're a Volcarona." Ash grinned when Larvesta tittered anxiously, undoubtedly already ready to start learning them right then. "They're going to be incredibly difficult, though, so let's wait with those." Larvesta slumped, and Ash chuckled.

"Well – there's still plenty to learn. Let's just start with Ember, and work our way up from there." Ash smiled when Larvesta jumped down from his hat, slowing down his fall with a short burst of fire from his horns. "Right – let's just start with giving it your best shot, and work from there. According to this, it's supposed to look like a spray of fire; tons of little bursts. Try to aim away from the forest, if you would. I don't want to cause an ecological disaster within my first hour away from home."

Larvesta tittered in easy compliance, focusing only briefly before opening her mouth and spitting out a couple of small flames, but they spluttered and died only a few feet away. Larvesta hung her head, but Ash grinned.

"That's a good start!" He said encouragingly. "Now, just try to put more power behind it, okay? We'll figure out how to do it eventually."

With another nod, they started walking again, Larvesta shooting little embers into the air as Ash watched on, occasionally calling out encouragingly to keep her going when she faltered.

Oo0oO

A lunch and quite a few hours later, Ash was setting up his tent next to a small, rather charming lake. The steady cadence of the waterfall was surprisingly calming, and Magikarp occasionally flitted underneath the surface of the water, making it quite the peaceful setting.

Larvesta had stopped practicing sometime during the day, having grown too tired to continue. While Bug-types were naturally quite mature when they came out of the egg, she didn't have the best endurance due to still being a baby, not that Ash had been expecting her to practise for even nearly as long as she had. Now, she was resting next to the tent Ash was setting up, silently watching on as he hammered the last few pins into the ground. With a sigh and wipe of his slightly sweaty forehead, Ash stood up and stretched. "Come on, Larvesta. Let's go and get some stuff to build a fire."

Luckily, it was August, which meant that there was a lot of dry grass around, mainly because it hadn't rained in a while. Though Larvesta might have been able to light a branch on fire, as well, Ash wasn't about to test that theory and completely exhaust his Pokémon in the process. Even an ordinary match would have been able to light a bunch of dried grass, so she'd have no problems with that.

It only took a little while to find the wood he needed – it was a forest, after all, and the hatchet Delia had somehow managed to fit in his bag was quite good in chopping way-too-big pieces of wood in pieces – but when he got back, a small purple rodent was rifling through his bag, undoubtedly attracted by the smell of food. Ash growled when he spotted the crumbles, realising that the Rattata had already eaten through a bunch of rations, and glanced down at Larvesta, who was glaring at the other Pokémon. "Feeling up for your first battle, Larvesta?"

Larvesta tittered in response, shuffling forwards to be able to aim correctly. Ash grinned, about to call out for an Ember, before remembering his tent, and his bag, and the other burnable stuff in there, and suddenly realising that that might not be the best course of action. Quickly changing his mind, Ash called out, "Use String Shot! Pull Rattata towards you!"

With a nod, Larvesta spat out a long string, which hooked itself around Rattata's leg and started pulling the struggling rat towards them with surprising speed. Ash grinned, already seeing the possibility for an easy tactic. "Larvesta! Ember on your string!"

Not questioning his order, Larvesta let go of her string, and shot a small flame at the flailing end, which quickly caught fire, spreading towards the Rattata's leg with surprising speed and setting the small rodent ablaze. Ash grimaced when it let out a loud shriek, and watched, suddenly feeling a little guilty, as it ran into the lake to get rid of the fire. It crawled back onto land soon after, thankfully, but it passed out immediately, leaving Ash to deal with the crumbs it had left behind and suddenly making him feel a lot less guilty after he realised that the Rattata had eaten over half of his rations, which were supposed to last him until Viridian.

Well, not that it would really matter all that much, in the end. There were plenty of trees with Oran and Sitrus Berries around, which were fit for human consumption as much as the rations his mother had packed him. Still, it was the principle of the thing – you didn't just steal food and get away with it, especially if you were stealing food from Ash Ketchum!

He was interrupted mid-mental monologue by the shiver that wracked his body, suddenly reminding him of the cold evening that was quickly approaching. "Oh, right." With a chuckle at his own forgetfulness, Ash dropped the pieces of wood he was still holding off next to his tent and set to work, first putting down a small ring of rocks to prevent the flames from spreading and lighting the entire forest on fire, before building up a small pyramid along the lines of what he'd learned from what Oak had taught him and Gary in preparation for their trip, which was then covered in dry grass. With a short nod at Larvesta, who quickly loosed a small ember upon the wooden construct, the clearing was quickly bathed in a warm orange light, casting dark shadows across the surrounding forest.

Luckily, the Pallet Woods were thick enough to prevent much light from shining across the forest. There were undoubtedly other people around, building their own fires and setting up their own tents or sleeping bags – such as Gary and the two that had taken Charmander and Bulbasaur – but the trees were too close together to make their fires visible from a distance. If the woods weren't as thick as they were – if Ash was sitting on an open route, for instance, or the famously thin White Forest over in Unova – there would undoubtedly be countless other trainers coming to challenge him.

For a few minutes, Ash merely basked in the fire's warmth, silently appreciating the quietly cackling light for breaching the almost creepy stillness of night. Then, when he was warm again and the cold was well and truly purged from their small clearing, Ash glanced up at Larvesta, who had dragged Rattata's freezing little body over to the fire when he hadn't been paying attention and was sitting next to the knocked-out rat with her eyes closed serenely.

With a slight smile at his new friend's gentle nature, Ash quickly reached over to the Rattata to check the extent of the damage done to the creature, which, thankfully, wasn't too severe, but he wrapped a small bandage around the leg that Larvesta had hooked with a String Shot, which looked to be faring the worst, anyways, just to be safe. Ash suspected that, unless he was going to catch the thing – which he wasn't; the day he caught a Rattata out of free will was the day he thought Charizard was ugly – it would be gone by morning, its naturally shy nature urging it to seek the safety and comfort of its own burrow.

"Larvesta?" Ash asked quietly, and his Pokémon rumbled surprisingly deeply in response. "Come on, let's go and crawl into bed. We both need sleep." Larvesta rumbled her assent, opening her eyes again to crawl after Ash into the tent. Ash smiled, before crawling into his tent and sleeping bag as well, feeling quite comfortable in his jeans and shirt next to Larvesta's warm body – Ash could easily compare it to a heated Teddiursa stuffed doll, only a living, breathing one.

The next day would be his first official day as a trainer, and Ash would well and truly be stepping into a new era of his life. It hadn't fully sunk in yet the day before, but from now on, it could very well be months or even an entire year until he saw anyone from Pallet again in person, excluding Gary, who would undoubtedly find some way to find him on the road merely to annoy the stuffing out of him. He'd left quite a bit behind by choosing the path of a trainer; his home, his friends, his sort-of grandfather Oak, and, perhaps even more importantly than all that, the possibility of a calm, quiet life in Pallet's suburbs, living a life completely out of the spotlight, raising his own family with one of the many girls around Pallet.

But with his departure, with his decision to choose the path of a trainer, the chances of all of that happening were gone. Trainers rarely, if ever, led a peaceful life, and barely two thirds ever found their significant other; a mere ten percent of those that took jobs with the League, as Ash was eventually planning to do, ever actually settled down and had families, with at least half of those that did being Gym Leaders and Professors.

So no, Ash likely wouldn't ever lead a calm and quiet life. But he didn't think that he'd have been able to stand that, anyways.

"Sleep well, Larvesta." Ash whispered, a slight smile spreading across his lips as he snuggled into his pillow.

The steady rumbling of Larvesta's breath told him his new friend had already fallen asleep.

Oo0oO

When Ash awoke, it wasn't to the calming sound of a cascading waterfall, to the happy chirping of Pidgey and Pidgeotto, or even to another Rattata rifling through his stuff with hungry fervour or a large flock of Spearow taking offense to his presence and choosing to attack.

No, it was the shrill shriek of a girl extremely close by that shook him violently back to the land of the living with a suddenness of an Accelgor on steroids, and Ash shot upright, momentarily concerned by his partner's absence before he found Larvesta standing in front of his bed with fire steadily shooting out her torches, thankfully not quite reaching the fabric of the tent, as she glared at the redhead that had chosen to peek her head through the flaps of his tent. Ash scowled, and rubbed his eyes sleepily.

"Larvesta, stand down. I'm sure she means no harm. You don't, right?" He directed the last part at the girl, who shook her head fast enough to make Ash fear for the safety of her neck's position as perch for her head. "Right. If you'll head back outside, I'll take a moment to actually wake up before I start interrogating you on why you stuck your head into an unknown person's tent at – what is it? – seven in the bloody morning."

The girl eep-ed when Larvesta let out another burst of fire, and quickly shuffled out of his tent, leaving Ash alone with his Pokémon. He glanced up at the still tense Larvesta even as he tried to worm his way out of his sleeping bag. "Larvesta, I appreciate your efforts for our safety deeply, but next time, please wake me before you start charging attacks, alright? You might burn down the tent on accident." Larvesta tittered in accord, though it had an edge to it that Ash wasn't able to identify – likely a begrudged affirmative.

"Right. Let's go." Ash smiled briefly at Larvesta, before pushing the flap of his tent out of the way with a sudden grimace. The light from the morning sun – which was, of course, shining right in his bloody face – was incredibly bright compared to the relative darkness of his tent, and he had to shield his eyes while they adjusted, taking the time to glance around the clearing.

The Rattata had, as Ash had expected, made its way out of the clearing some time during the night, taking the bandages Ash had wrapped around its rather badly burnt leg with it. Ash wasn't really concerned about littering up the forest that way; Rattata were surprisingly intelligent, and it would undoubtedly find some way to get rid of its bandages, which a Pidgey or Spearow would then probably use as material for their nest. Spearow especially were notorious for utilising whatever they could find, so the bandages likely wouldn't remain lying around for more than a day before they were repurposed as something equally useful.

A small charred pit in front of his tent told Ash that the campfire had gone out sometime during the night – not that he'd expected otherwise – though plenty of the wood he and Larvesta had gathered was still lying near the charred pit, completely untouched. Ash could probably stuff some of the dried grass in his bag for the next night, though he didn't even think about taking the thicker branches with him – they were way too heavy, and with the Pallet Woods being, well, woods, there was plenty of ordinary wood to be found around, in front of, and inside every corner.

The redhead from earlier was sitting on a rock outcropping next to the lake, and was fishing quietly. A distinct lack of Magikarp next to her made it clear that she probably hadn't had much luck – even amongst the particularly soft-hearted Magikarp were seen as good food, and with how many there were, practically everyone ate at least one every week. Unless, of course, the girl was a water-specialist, who'd probably want to capture a Magikarp to train up into a Gyarados, but she was looking frustrated enough for Ash to discard that option almost as soon as it popped into his head.

"Having any luck?" Ash asked amiably as he slid up next to her, and the girl's head snapped over to him immediately. She flushed.

"Not at all." The girl sighed. "Look, I'm sorry about earlier. I've been fishing here for quite a while in the hopes of catching a Poliwag, but there's never been someone else here before, so I was curious."

"Ah." Ash smiled. "Well, when Larvesta starts pumping out fire, she does look rather frightening, so I can understand why you reacted the way you did." A scratch behind her ears told Larvesta that her trainer had only been halfway serious, and the girl's head snapped up to stare at Larvesta as if she'd only just noticed that the Bug-type was there. She paled noticeably.

"Y-yeah. That's it. L-Larvesta just looks scary." Ash raised a curious eyebrow at her stuttering, but didn't say anything. The girl shook herself. "Sorry, I'm – er – not used to dealing with Larvesta. I'm Misty."

"Ash." Ash grinned, choosing not to question how the girl even knew about Larvesta existing. "By the way, did you know that there aren't any Poliwag here?"

The girl – Misty, Ash corrected himself – froze. "I-I'm sorry, but what?"

"Yeah." Ash continued, oblivious to Misty's distress, and Larvesta let out an amused titter. "Well, there was a colony not so long ago, but a few months ago, a Magikarp evolved – no clue how it managed that on its own in a small lake – but it required nourishment, and found the Poliwag and Poliwhirl more acceptable prey than its own kin." Misty paled even further. "The only reason I know about this is because it was rather big news in Pallet when it happened – this used to be a popular fishing spot, where fathers would take their sons for a weekend of catching Magikarp and playing with the Poliwag, back before the Gyarados, but now mothers find it too dangerous for their children, and fathers don't want to run the risk of accidently getting pulled in and eaten by the Gyarados." Ash shrugged. "I hadn't realised it was this lake they were talking about until you mentioned the Poliwag – this is the only place around Pallet a colony has been in quite a while."

"Oh, god." Misty muttered, looking ready to hurl. "B-but what about the unconscious Poliwhirl I fished up a couple of days ago? I threw it back, because I couldn't have been able to keep it without proving my power to it, which I can't do with my team, but –"

"It was likely already dead." Ash said bluntly. "There could be one or two Poliwag or Poliwhirl still hiding in some alcoves, somewhere deep down, but they'll probably get found out and eaten by the Gyarados at one point or another." He shrugged. "It's the way of the world. There was bound to be some sort of power struggle in this lake one day, and it happened to be a Magikarp that evolved into a Gyarados, instead of a Poliwhirl that became a Poliwrath. If it had been a Poliwrath instead, the Magikarp would likely have diminished as much as the Poliwag and –Whirl have."

"I think I'm going to be sick." Misty muttered, looking as white as a shiny Amaura, and quickly ran away behind some bushes. Ash and Larvesta both blinked at her sudden departure, before Ash turned to the fishing rod with a shrug and a grin.

"Now, let's see if we can't catch ourselves some tasty breakfast…"

Oo0oO

After failing spectacularly in catching anything – not that he'd have known how to prepare a Magikarp for eating anyways, never mind the fact that he'd actually have had to have decapitated the Pokémon with a knife to even be able to get started on that – Ash had resigned himself to eating berries for the rest of the trip to Viridian, and he was just getting started on his first Oran Berry from a nearby bush when Misty returned, looking only slightly less pale than she had when she'd left.

Without saying anything, she ripped open her bag, which was sitting, forgotten, next to her fishing rod, and stuffed a pre-made sandwich into her mouth, likely to get rid of the taste of puke, if the left-over blotches on her shirt were any indication. Then, she took out a small towel, dipped it in the lake, and started cleaning her shirt, leaving small yellow patches completely see-through. Ash quickly averted his eyes and began to tear down his tent, which, thanks to some kind of ingenious Silph Co. design no ordinary human could ever hope to understand, was completed in less than a minute, excluding the time it took to wrench the pins from the ground.

"Hey." Just as Ash was stuffing his sleeping bag into his actual bag, Misty called out to him, and he glanced over, only to find her standing, cleaned up and dry, next to a bike. "I'm going to Viridian. There's nothing for me to do here, if the Poliwag are really –" She swallowed – "If they're really dead. If you want, you can drive the both of us there – I would, but I'm not strong enough."

For a second, Ash actually considered it, to save some of the time it would take to get to Cerulean, but a curious titter from Larvesta made him think otherwise. "I'd love to, but I'm going to have to decline." Misty didn't look surprised. "It's nothing to do with you, I just want to have more time to train Larvesta before we do anything else."

"I understand." Misty nodded, before handing him a slip of paper she'd obviously prepared earlier. She'd expected his refusal, then. "If you ever get a water-type and want some tips, call me. I'm a specialist, and even though I have little practical knowledge, my sisters drilled me well enough to ensure that I won't forget all twenty-one moves Dewgong can naturally learn anytime soon." She flashed him a smile, and Ash nodded in thanks.

"I suppose that I'll be seeing you sometime in the future, then." Misty grinned, swinging one leg over her bike. "Goodbye, Ash!" She called back as she rode off, and Ash waved with a smile as the girl weaved a path through the trees and onto the open road.

Larvesta let out an amused titter, and Ash glared at her, blushing slightly. "Shut up, Larvesta. Let's see if you still talk – er – make noise that way when you've had dirt outlast you in Ember practise."

Oo0oO

"Right." Ash frowned, eyes focused on the little screen in front of him, where another Larvesta was using Ember. He had to shield the screen from the glare of the morning sun with one hand, and still had to squint to make out what was going on, but Larvesta, who had been practising his not-quite Ember, trying to get it to become more powerful to no avail and was sitting on his hat to peek at the screen with him, seemed to have no such trouble, and merely blinked. "I found this feature while rummaging around in the Pokédex a few minutes ago, Larvesta. It shows a little clip of the move that's being mentioned. It's meant for trainers who are stuck trying to teach their Pokémon a new move, but I think this qualifies as well."

Larvesta nodded silently, now suddenly quite a bit more interested in the Pokédex. Ash grinned, before squinting at the screen, trying to make out some of the smaller details. "See that?" He asked quietly, pointing with one finger at the Larvesta's torches, which were puffing out tiny plumes of fire every time it used Ember. Larvesta nodded again. "Does that help you any? Maybe you need to focus your power in the same way as you do when firing fire from your torches, only direct it to your mouth, or something."

Ash' Pokémon shot him an unimpressed look – because learning a new move was, of course, hardly as simple as merely redirecting some other natural instinct – but hopped down nevertheless, readying herself up for a brief moment before letting rip a surprisingly strong burst of flame from his torches, which sent Ash jumping back with a surprised yelp. Larvesta tittered laughingly as Ash scowled at her, but quickly returned to the matter at hand, loosing several more bursts of fire before suddenly sending not just two or three, but an entire spray of small little flames flying through the air, accompanied by a massive burst of flames that sent Ash careening back from the heat and left Larvesta panting.

"Yeah, amazing job, Larvesta!" Ash cheered, not even caring any about his suddenly singed face. Larvesta tittered happily, if extremely tiredly. "Now to keep from spending as much power. But if we do that, we're good! This is great!"

"Good morning." Ash and Larvesta both blinked at the new voice, suddenly shocked out of their partying by someone else, and looked up to meet the eyes of a rather… _unique_ man, who was looking at Larvesta with a curious expression on his bespectacled face. "A Larvesta. Haven't seen one of those in a while."

He shook himself, the long, blue lock of hair that stuck out from his blonde forehead swinging with the motion. "But I digress. Is Pallet someplace around here? I am required to visit for business, and was told to go south from Viridian, but I have been walking for days, and there still isn't a town to be found. My Pokénav doesn't have any battery left, either."

"Er – yeah." Ash blinked again. "But – why do you need to be there? I mean, there's no large businesses or anything."

The man looked amused. "Well, what else would you call Oak's ranch?"

"Oh. Yeah." Ash grinned sheepishly, and Larvesta tittered, sounding amused. "I left Pallet the day before yesterday. Just follow the road, I suppose. You'll see it sooner or later. It's rather hard to miss."

"Alright." The strange man nodded, before setting off again, his white scientist's cloak billowing behind him as he walked. "Good morning, kid." He called again. "Do take care to avoid the skeletons you'll find while you're on your journey. I hear they can be quite… _unpleasant_ when aggravated."

"Er – goodbye, I suppose." Ash muttered bemusedly as the man moved around a bend and out of view. "Weird guy. Girly, too." Larvesta tittered again, almost like laughter, and Ash grinned.

"But now, onwards! Onwards, to a perfect Ember!"

Oo0oO

It took Ash and Larvesta the rest of the week to get to Viridian. As they grew farther away from Pallet and got closer to Viridian, the amount of trainers around increased, to the point where they could scarcely go fifteen minutes without running into a trainer requesting a battle. The most of these, Ash turned down, as a large part of trainers that started around Viridian started out with Pidgey from Route 1, which, even if only trained a little, would completely destroy Larvesta with a single Gust until she learned to fully harness her Ember to not tire herself out in an instant.

The ones he did accept, however, were usually done quite quickly. Rattata were perfect for practising their String Shot-Ember combo on, which didn't require Larvesta to tire herself out within a few attacks, and the occasional trainer that passed by with a unique Pokémon, such as a Machop, Zubat, Meowth, or even Scyther or Staryu always proved an interesting, if difficult battle, not all of which Ash won. The desperation of nearly getting caught by Scyther's sharp scythes or Meowth's deadly claws served to push Larvesta to new heights, and she'd even managed a Leech Life when the aforementioned Machop had clutched her and she'd bitten him in desperation.

There had been one incredibly troublesome incident where a kid had suddenly pulled out a Geodude and immediately started attacking, but Ash had recalled Larvesta before anything could happen, and had already taken out his wallet to pay his loser's fine when the kid had started yelling, calling him a coward and threatening to sic Geodude on him if he didn't send his 'stupid bug' out again. Ash had, in a moment of idiocy, acquiesced, and, in a battle that took nearly ten minutes and way too many near-misses for Ash to count, Larvesta had ever-so-slowly whittled down the – incredibly slow, even for its species – Geodude's strength with millions of String Shot-Ember combos until it simply collapsed from exhaustion.

Of course, the kid had called him a cheater, and demanded a rematch, but at that point, Ash had simply started walking away, too annoyed to give a crap about the money he should have gotten for winning.

When Ash did finally arrive at Viridian, however, it was to pure and utter chaos. The supposedly quite hospitable city was on complete lockdown, it almost seemed like. Police and members of the Indigo army alike were scurrying everywhere, their incredibly powerful Pokémon by their side, and before Ash could do as much as move a toe inside the city walls, he was halted by an officer, who looked as if she hadn't slept in a week.

"I'll need to see your identification, kid." She sighed, and held out a hand for his ID. Ash blinked, and started sifting through his bag for his wallet.

"What's going on, Officer?" He asked curiously. Larvesta rumbled unidentifiably from his place upon Ash' hat, blinking, and the officer glanced up at her before turning back to Ash.

"I suppose you wouldn't have heard if you came from Pallet just now. There was a break-in in Professor Oak's lab, the one in Pallet, a few days ago." Ash' hand went slack and he was just barely able to prevent is ID from slipping through his fingers as he gaped at the officer.

"W-what?"

The officer raised an eyebrow at his shock, before scanning his ID card with her device, figuring it none of her business. "You heard me. Someone made their way inside – smashed a window while an obviously quite experienced Porygon-Z disrupted the systems protecting the Porygon that protected the actual alarms, deleted the other Porygon's data, essentially killing them, and then momentarily lifted the alarms to allow its master to slip through – and was apparently caught by one of the cameras rummaging through the Professor's large storage of Pokémon. We think that he'd allowed himself to get caught, as he could easily have had his Porygon-Z delete the footage, but I don't think we'll ever figure that out – he's obviously incredibly skilled, and will probably be able to escape capture no matter what we do.

"He didn't take anything, which is the weird part, but as you can see, the protection for the towns and cities around Pallet has been heightened a ton. There's an entire squad of the army stationed near Pallet, as well, and near Cordovan, too, guarding both the coastline and the town itself."

She sighed, handing Ash' ID back to him, which he accepted with a shaking hand. "You're clear to go through. It's a right old mess, this is."

"Do you –" Ash gulped, his stomach sinking into his feet with dread – "Do you have any idea who it was?"

"We don't have a clue." The Officer sighed again. "Luckily, he's pretty recognisable, which is why we even bother with stationing this many people everywhere. The only reason we even ask for IDs is in case he got a disguise." She shrugged.

"All we know is that the man – whoever it was – was wearing a lab coat, a pair of glasses, and had a single lock of blue hair curling around his head." She smiled mirthlessly. "Thieves get more unique every time, but I suppose that's nothing but news for us. Move along, kid."

Oo0oO

It was in a haze that Ash entered Viridian, one that not even Larvesta's concerned tittering could bring him out of. The fact of the matter was that he'd pointed the thief into the Professor's direction – he'd seen him, talked to him, even – and hadn't even gotten a name to prove it.

Crime was a pretty big thing in Kanto. It generally ranged from petty thievery to the capturing of protected species to sell on the Black Market – because capturing a Rattata, for example, and selling it on a public auction was a perfectly normal and genuine practise, but a Tyranitar or even a Gyarados was highly illegal and a felony that could get you up to a lifelong sentence in prison, depending on the species and scope of the operation – but usually, the offenders were caught in the act sooner or later, most of the time when becoming overconfident in their abilities and suddenly finding themselves facing an entire squad of the Indigo army.

Never in the history of the Indigo League, whose greatest pride lay in its ability to protect incredibly important stuff, had anything even close to this happened. Over a dozen times, criminal organisations had tried to bust high-ranking members out of Kanto and Johto's collective prison, The Abyss, only to be locked inside by a single squad of the Indigo Army, which would then pursue and more often than not take down the entire syndicate surrounding the rescue party as well. Even more often than that, criminals tried to break into Professor Oak's virtually impenetrable bunker of a lab, or decided to try and take a few Pokémon from the corral to sell, or to use for their own. Not once had they succeeded.

Not once, that is, until then.

On a purely intellectual level, Ash knew that he'd really had no influence, positive or negative, on the situation, and that the Scientist, as Ash had started calling him, would have broken into Oak's lab regardless of whether he'd been there when he had been or not. He hadn't helped the Scientist along, certainly not, but Ash could have easily pointed him in completely the wrong direction, which would have – Ash thought for a second, his mind racing through all of the possibilities – postponed it, but it wouldn't have done much else, because the Scientist would have undoubtedly found his way towards Pallet eventually. So there wasn't anything Ash could have done.

But on an emotional level, Ash couldn't accept that – couldn't accept the fact that he hadn't seen through the ruse of the Scientist's claim that he had business with the Professor, couldn't accept that he hadn't sent a message through his Pokédex to Oak afterwards, to check, just to be sure – and he was beating himself up over it, because really, how hard could it have been to –

Ash was shocked out of his thoughts by a painful collision with a tall strangely blue-haired man, who scowled. "Watch where you're going, kid." He growled in an accent that sounded almost as if it came straight from the depths of Sinnoh, before looping around Ash and Larvesta and stalking off. Ash blinked when Larvesta tittered concernedly, and reached up to scratch her behind her ears with a faked smile.

"I'm fine, Larvesta." From what little part of her face Ash could see, Larvesta didn't look convinced. "Really, I am. Just thinking a little." Ash glanced around curiously. "Come on, let's go find the Pokémon centre. We could both use a nice bed for once."

Oo0oO

"Hello, Professor." Ash smiled at the videophone, and the Professor, who looked quite harried, grinned back.

"Ash! How are you, my boy? You certainly took your time getting to Viridian. Delia was about to go over there herself and see if you'd actually been changing your –"

"I get it, Professor!" Ash interrupted hastily, and Oak's grin grew. "I've already called Mom, but there's something I have to tell you."

"Oh?"

"I heard from the officer that checked my ID that your lab was broken into a few days ago." Professor Oak blinked at that, before nodding and motioning for Ash to go on. Ash took a deep breath, bracing himself for the outburst that was bound to come. "I ran into the guy that did it on Route 1."

"You _what_?" The Professor sounded quite dangerous, and Ash hurried to explain himself, lest his mentor were to reach through the connection to pull him through just to interrogate him.

"The Scientist told me that he had business with you, and with his lab coat, I believed him. The police actually got his appearance spot-on; the only thing I can tell you is that whatever hair he had that wasn't blue was blonde. We had a short conversation, he said something about Larvesta –" Oak's eyes narrowed – "asked if he was on the correct route for Pallet, and gave me some weird advice about skeletons, before continuing on. He seemed quite friendly, really, and I thought that he was maybe one of Professor Sycamore's aides. You know, with the weird hair, and everything."

Professor Oak nodded understandingly. "I get it. It wasn't your fault, Ash, no matter what you might be telling yourself right now." He grinned. "It's actually a fairly reasonable assumption that he was one of Sycamore's, though I'm not quite sure that even he would force that kind of hair upon his aides." Ash grinned as well, before they both sobered up, a crash in the background and Oak's reflexive wince reminding them that it was a thief they were talking about, not one of the Professor's colleagues.

Oak cleared his throat, looking oddly serious. "Listen, Ash, if my assumption is correct, then you might very well meet the Scientist, as you called him, again. He might actually be going after you." Ash' eyes widened, and Professor Oak frowned. "That's not to say that you should be wary of every corner you turn, but just know that if you see him again, then no matter the circumstances, just run. If his Porygon-Z alone was able to take care of my entire alarm system, then I can only imagine what the rest of his team might be like."

Ash nodded. "Alright, Professor. But – if he's that strong, shouldn't he be able to catch up to me in no time flat, with a Pidgeot or something?"

The Professor shook his head. "That doesn't matter. Just run. He might actually leave you alone, if his character is like I suspect it is." He suddenly frowned. "Did you tell Delia about this?"

"I didn't." Ash winced when Oak's frown deepened, fearing another outburst. "I just – I thought Mom might stop me from continuing with my journey, or force me to give Larvesta back to you."

"While I'm fairly certain that she won't do that," The Professor replied, sounding amused of all things, "She _will_ be incredibly worried, and might constantly bother me about your safety. So really, I'm kind of grateful that you didn't tell her, even if I might have gotten another aide out of it." They both grinned. "Take care, Ash. And try not to get eaten in Viridian Forest. I'm not sure that I'd be able to handle your mother should you come home wrapped in a bundle of silk strings."

Ash' grin widened. "I'll try, Professor. And I suppose the same will go for you. You never know what kind of dangerous Caterpie might be lurking in the corral."

Oak chuckled, and nodded. "I'll make sure to bring Arcanine with me wherever I go." He smiled. "Goodbye, Ash. And good luck."

"Thanks. Goodbye, Professor."

Oo0oO

It was only the next day that Ash and Larvesta set out again towards Route 2, which would lead them into Viridian Forest after only a day's walk.

Despite being the main city on the road that leads from Kanto to Johto, Viridian held very little of worth to trainers, aside from the currently abandoned Gym – Giovanni was away on vacation, or something – and was only attractive to non-trainers because of its massive shopping district and the several cinemas that were scattered around the city; not exactly something that Ash was willing to waste his money on, especially after spending a ton to refill his rations for the trip through Viridian Forest.

There was, of course, an easy path to take – the main road from Viridian to Pewter was constantly being patrolled by people from the League and the Indigo Police Forces, and even had asphalted roads for the faster land-bound Pokémon to easily zoom across at high speeds, for those that had one. There ran Mantine lines, too, as much for the non-trainers as otherwise, but Ash wasn't planning to take the quick way out.

Larvesta still needed training, and a lot of it, if they were ever planning on standing a chance against Cerulean's Gym Leaders. They'd need a new member to the party, something that could withstand some hits from a water-type, too – though preferably not another bug-type – but as Pikachu were particularly elusive as far as Pokémon within Viridian Forest came, there was very little chance of that happening. The most likely thing was that Ash would end up getting one of the Zubat from Mt. Moon, not that he was particularly thrilled about that – the most he'd get otherwise were Geodude and Onix, which were even worse of a choice, or a Pidgey, which was so generic, even Zubat scoffed at them.

But that didn't mean that Larvesta was going to be neglected in the meantime. In fact, Ash was planning to work on the move she'd displayed so magnificently in the fight against the Machop a couple of days earlier – Leech Life would be much better to use against the Sisters than Ember, even though it would require Larvesta to rope her enemy in with a String Shot first. Not to mention that practising a move that utilises fire anywhere inside a forest aside from on the main road or in large clearings would probably be a horrible idea, resulting in plenty of death everywhere.

Somehow, Ash couldn't imagine a forest fire in the middle of Viridian Forest being safe for anyone, but then again, maybe that was just him. Who knew what kind of crazy people stalked about in there.

Oo0oO

Plenty of them, as Ash soon found out.

It was a surprisingly common theme to find trainers specialising in one type, likely in the hopes of eventually being able to start up their own gym, one of the minor ones in the smaller towns scattered across the Kanto forests. Water-type trainers usually gathered around large bodies of water, and near the coastline, while Grass- and Poison-type specialisers sought out the forests and Fire-type trainers went all across the known regions to explore volcanoes and comet sites.

Most of these trainers were held in high regard, for choosing to pursue one single line of Pokémon with such dedication, and it took quite a bit of it, too, to overcome the plentiful weaknesses owning only Pokémon of a single type had to have. However, most of these trainers never made it far in the Indigo League, simply due to every team in there having at least some members that could easily counter their singular type specialty. It was only the true masters of the type that became major Gym leaders, or even members of the Elite Four, and had a shot at becoming the Champion – though quite a few regions, such as Unova and Sinnoh, didn't really seem to care much about having their Champions own a single type of Pokémon only, but that was beside the point.

One of the trainers amongst these that was held in the highest regard was Aaron, the Bug-type specialist from the Sinnoh Elite Four. Someone had even calculated that, should there be a Pokémon that was all types at the same time, any Bug-type damage done to it would be lowered to one-thirty-second of its original damage, simply due to the sheer amount of types that resist it. It took a special kind of dedication, even amongst the mono-type specialists, to train up such a type strong enough to earn yourself a place in the Elite Four.

However, at the same time, it was Viridian's Bug Catchers who were considered worse than the grime on the sole of your boots amongst the starting trainers in the surrounding towns and cities.

Simply put, Bug Catchers aimed at getting Pokémon to evolve quickly, to have an easy time training them up due to being evolved fully practically from birth, which automatically made them more powerful than normal Pokémon, because they were already fully evolved. At least, that's what the Bug Catchers theorised.

In reality, training up a Pokémon with the only thought in mind being to have them evolved as soon as possible so that they'd have an easy time becoming strong worked against them. A Beedrill was only about as strong as a Bulbasaur or a Squirtle, despite already having evolved twice, and it was their trainer's overconfidence in their Pokémon that made things even worse, not even bothering to train and give their Pokémon new attacks and strategies they could use.

So Bug Catchers were hated by everyone, for trying and failing to choose the easy way out. Everyone including Ash, who ran into one every five minutes, and was immediately challenged to a battle by every single one of them, only to be threatened to be stung by their Beedrill when he rejected due to being so exasperated that he just wanted to get on with his journey.

Larvesta finally got Ember down pat, though, due to the surprising amount of clearings around the edge of Viridian Forest, so that was one plus about to situation. Not that Ash could find it in himself to care right then, infuriatingly annoyed with the situation as he was.

Oo0oO

It took a few days for the ridiculous amount of Bug Catchers to thin out as only those strong or stupid enough to venture deeply into the forest remained, though they were by no means a rare encounter, and instead of meeting one every five minutes, Ash came across them every hour or so, being, of course, challenged to a fight upon being spotted every single time.

Eventually, these battles began to actually get challenging, as only the strong remained, and the amount of non-Beedrill-infested clearings around dwindled to next to none, severely limiting Larvesta's fighting capabilities as any Ember shot would undoubtedly light the entire forest on fire.

There was no doubt in Ash' mind that a single spray of Ember would have knocked out almost any team they came up against instantly, but because that was unavailable, unorthodox tactics had to be used; Ash' favourite to use against flying targets was something he'd dubbed String Sledgehammer, where Larvesta bound her target in a String Shot and slammed it against nearby trees. Extremely brutal, but very, _very_ effective.

Land-bound targets, meanwhile, were merely assaulted by Leech Life, and if that took too long, launched into a tree through the magic of String Shot, more often than not knocking them out immediately. It only took a little while for circumstances to dissuade Ash of his newfound habit of going for flair instead of effectiveness; he wasn't about to repeat his mistakes, not after the first time he'd tried and Larvesta nearly got knocked out cold by a Gust from a Beautifly barely a second after.

And so, the rest of Ash' trek through Viridian Forest continued, most of the two-and-a-half weeks he was forced to spend weeding through the undergrowth as he weaved his way around the various 'danger zones' that had been marked on his map spent in complete silence, with only the occasional command to Larvesta keeping his voice from going rough from disuse. It wasn't that he didn't want to talk, it was that there wasn't really anything to say; by the end of the second week, Larvesta understood him well enough without words, even if it sometimes took a few extra to specify what exactly he meant.

It wasn't until the last few days that trainers began popping up again in relative frequency, though these seemed to have a more varied combination of Pokémon; some trainers Ash ran into had Mankey and Nidoran of both genders instead of the standard Bug-types he'd come to expect, and there had even been a memorable incident when a random trainer had suddenly pulled out an Onix from Mount Moon, who Ash had surrendered to at once. Aside from these, there were, of course, still the standard Bug Catchers absolutely everywhere, but Ash didn't really have a problem with these until the very last day of his stay in Viridian Forest, near the borders of Pewter, when he had finally decided to go back to the main path.

"Halt!" Ash blinked when a ridiculously dressed kid suddenly jumped in front of him, a surprisingly sharp blade held aloft by a kid that seemed to be around his age, dressed in a set of ridiculous fake samurai armour. "I doth be the Great Viridian Samurai!" The kid declared, and Ash had to resist the urge to chuckle. "I beseech thee with the request of a battle! And kindly doth not deny, as doing so would be unchivalrous, to sayeth the fewest."

Ash grinned. "Sure. One on one?"

The kid nodded. "Very well! I doth accept these terms!" He stepped back, sheathing his sword in favour of a black Pokéball that looked like the red part had simply been spray-painted over with a can of black paint. "I shall reveal my Pocket Monster first, to give thee the advantage in this skirmish! Make thee entrance, noble sir!"

Perhaps not so surprisingly, the Pokéball the kid had tossed into the air erupted into a Pinsir, who were known to be quite chivalrous Pokémon – hence, partway, the name. The Pinsir cried out in greeting, though it was more of a roar than a happy wave, and Ash' grin grew. "Come on out, Larvesta!"

Larvesta, who Ash had returned to her Pokéball after the undergrowth was becoming a bit too dense for her to navigate through without getting lost, tittered a greeting to Ash as soon as she appeared, but quickly became serious upon seeing the Pinsir staring down at her menacingly, its massive pincers clacking together in a clear warning.

"Let us begin this battle, Pinsir!" The kid called out extravagantly, motioning forwards with his arm, which was holding his sword again. "Vice Grip, now!"

"Larvesta, into the trees!" Ash commanded sharply, watching with wary eyes as the Pinsir shot closer and snapped its great pincers shut around the spot Larvesta had been in only half a second earlier, having only gotten away into the canopy above due to a quick String Shot.

"A good move, my adversary, but I am afraid that it was not quite good enough!" The kid grinned. "Pinsir, Earthquake!"

Ash scowled. The kid had beefed his Pinsir up with TMs, it seemed. "String Shot around the branch you're on, Larvesta! Hold on tight!"

That was all he could say, however, because the Pinsir suddenly slammed its pincers into the ground, causing a small earthquake around the clearing that sent both Ash and the kid falling on their arses. Some of the trees around the clearing uprooted and fell over, though none contained Larvesta. The kid grinned, despite not having found Larvesta yet. "Good! Keep going, Pinsir! We shall findeth the Bug yet!"

Pinsir roared and reared back, getting ready to cause a second earthquake. Ash' mind raced to find a solution to his problem, but had trouble coming up with one – a single Earthquake would be enough to put Larvesta out of commission, her fragile Fire-type body not being able to withstand the tremors accompanying most Ground-type moves, and while Magnet Rise would be a temporary solution, she wasn't nearly proficient enough with it to be able to attack at the same time. On the other hand, staying up in the trees would eventually cause the tree Larvesta was in to fall down, taking the Bug-type with it.

Frowning, Ash snapped just as Pinsir started his second Earthquake, calling out the loudest he could to make sure Larvesta heard him over the deafening noise; "Larvesta! Try to hit Pinsir with String Shot, and see if you can light the string on fire!"

The kid frowned when a large string suddenly shot out from one of the few trees that still stood, wrapping Pinsir up into a neat package within a second, the massive Bug-type having been unable to evade whilst his horns were still being wrenched from the ground, but the frown turned into a panicked, wide-eyed look when the end of the string was suddenly on fire, quickly spreading towards the cocoon in a manner that had Ash reminiscing all the way back to his first night out in Pallet Woods, which was already an entire month earlier. "Pinsir! Get out of there!"

But Pinsir wasn't fast enough to cut away the string, having no natural defences such as scythes and sharp claws aside from his pincers; while the string around his head was gone quickly enough and his pincers were largely unharmed, the rest of its body was still covered by the time the fire spread, and its body was quickly lit on fire, making the Pinsir screech shrilly and Ash flinch and cover his ears from the sudden painful sound.

"Damn!" The kid cursed, removing one hand from his ears to grab Pinsir's Pokéball from his belt. "Pinsir, return!" A familiar red light flashed out and absorbed Pinsir into the Pokéball, and Ash breathed a sigh of relief as he removed his hands from his ears.

Larvesta, who suddenly turned up beside him, tittered in concern, and Ash smiled at his Pokémon. "I'm not hurt, Larvesta. You did amazing – I doubt anything else in this forest would have stood up as well to Pinsir as you did." Larvesta preened at the praise, and tittered happily at her trainer.

The kid snorted as he came up to Ash, having clipped Pinsir's ball to his belt. "That's certainly true – I've been hanging around here looking for a good match for quite some time." He'd apparently given up on his ridiculous samurai imitation after he'd briefly broken character due to his worry over Pinsir. "Everyone around here has either Bug-types, something from within Mt. Moon such as Geodude and Zubat, or something from outside the place like Nidoran and Mankey." Ash nodded; he'd experienced the same thing. "There was a dude with a Squirtle, who managed to evade Pinsir's opening move, as well, which nobody ever really does, but he lost right after from a Brick Break."

"Well, it's not that there are a lot of powerful trainers around here." Ash pointed out. "Because of Rock-types being weak to so much stuff, tons of beginner trainers come to Pewter for their first battle, despite the geographical distance. Water- and Grass-types are available practically everywhere, which makes it incredibly easy to score a quick win."

The kid nodded. "True enough."

Ash blinked, suddenly remembering that he still didn't know the kid's name. "I'm Ash Ketchum. Nice to meet you." He greeted, extending his hand to the kid, who blinked, apparently having forgotten as well.

"Right." The kid smiled, reaching over to shake his hand. "I'm Nobunaga. Oda Nobunaga. And likewise."

Ash stared. "You can't be serious. You can't."

"Oh, but I am."

"…Your parents hated you, didn't they?"

"…Shut up."

* * *

 _ *****_ **Before anyone claims bullshit on the floating Larvesta thing, allow me to note that it did this very thing in Episode 702 of the anime. If you have to blame someone, blame the guys at Pokémon for not making sense, not me.**

 _ **A/N: Damn. Plot twists, out-of-place characters, and the death of a Poliwag colony, and we're barely a chapter in. Shit, I move fast.**_

 ** _A few more things before I go – firstly, whether you're interested or not_ _,_ LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK _(Pay attention to this, people who are just glancing over this note!). I like reviews, and I'll reply to every question I get at the end of every chapter._**

 ** _Secondly, a random disclaimer: Don't own Pokémon, and technically don't own the first line of the summary, 'cause I took it from Daft Punk. Also, the cover image belongs to Amaterasu 121 on Zerochan - at least, that's the person that uploaded it, I don't have a clue if they made it themselves. The plot and any OC characters I might make to fill up the blanks are, of course, mine._**

 _ **Lastly, a few notes on the chapter:**_

 _ **The guy at the beginning that broke into Oak's lab was, of course, Colress – there really isn't any point in hiding it, not that I went through great lengths to do that in the first place. He's got his own purpose for being in Kanto, which will be revealed as the fic goes along.**_

 _ **Oda Nobunaga was a famous Samurai in Japan from around 1550 that gave rise to the last shogunate rule over Japan, which lasted for over three hundred years – and a shogun, if you didn't know, is a hereditary position of military dictator. The guy never became shogun himself, instead committing Seppuku – honourable suicide – when he was betrayed by one of his generals while under minimal guard. I think we all can see why you wouldn't want to be named after him.**_

 _ **On the subject of the title: Spinning Wheel is a song by Blood, Sweat & Tears. The first line, 'What goes up must come down', is Heraclites' Hodos Ano Kato at its simplest. There's a lot more to it than that, of course, but it is what, in the end, summarises Hodos Ano Kato best. Its meaning will probably become clear as the story continues.**_

 _ **And that's it for this horrendously massive Author's Note! I sincerely hope to see you all next time, people, because I can tell you right now that I already have a large part of the story planned out, and it's going to be awesome.**_

 _ **-The Baron**_


	2. Part 1 - Episode 2

_**A/N: Holy fucking shit, this chapter was a bitch. All I wanted was for Ash to get to Mt. Moon. Then, this shit came along.**_

 _ **You'll see what I mean once you start reading. Talk about getting side-tracked.**_ _ **  
**_

 **A short note for any new followers:**

 **Unlike my other current project, The Snitch Effect – which is, by the way, currently on hiatus – I won't have an update schedule, simply because it's much more relaxed to update whenever I want rather than continuously pump out a chapter a week. It makes the chapters feel rather rushed, in my opinion. I can promise, however, to always put out a chapter every two weeks, and I'll aim for doing one every week, but no promises. Really, it's whatever works best for me, and I haven't found that yet.**

 **Also, a ton of thanks for my lovely Beta, LonelyStarling, for reading through this chapter. You were a great help, as always ^^**

 _ **-The Baron**_

* * *

 **Part 1: Birth**

 **Episode 2: De la Terre à la Lune**

" _Wise men talk because they have something to say;  
"Fools, because they have to say something."  
-Plato, circa 380 B.C._

"So, what Pokémon have you got?" Ash blinked when Nobunaga – because, as the wannabe Samurai had explained, he preferred the old-school style of Johtovian introduction (that of surname first) over the new-school Kalosian surname-last version, which had quickly taken the world by storm – spoke up after nearly half an hour of walking, and glanced over from his Pokédex with a raised eyebrow.

After their brief yet quite destructive battle, Nobunaga had told Ash that he was going to Mt. Moon, to look for stronger trainers beyond Pewter City. Since they were headed in the same direction, they'd decided to travel together for the time being, and had been travelling in comfortable silence thenceforth. It was the first time either of them had spoken up, and Nobunaga flushed under Ash' look. "Hey, you might have a nifty little device to look at, but the most I've got is a massive book, an encyclopaedia of the Kanto and Johto Pokémon, which isn't exactly comfortable to read while walking."

Ash nodded, understanding his new acquaintance's need for conversation, and snapped his Pokédex shut, clipping it back next to his Pokéballs on the belt Delia had packed him. "Well, I've got Larvesta, and that's it." One corner of his mouth twitched up in a smile when Larvesta purred comfortably, and he reached a hand up to scratch her behind her ears.

Nobunaga's eyebrows disappeared into his hair, which suddenly hung quite low, now that he'd gotten rid of his helmet – Ash had been around Daisy and her band of giggling accomplices enough to know what girls might consider 'handsome', and it made him wonder why the boy bothered to hide his face behind such an uncomfortable piece of headwear. "What, seriously?"

"Well, yeah." Ash shrugged. "I've only been on the road for a month, and the only Pokémon that habitats the area in between Pallet Town and Pewter with any substantial regularity that I might want to use is a Pikachu, and they're as rare as they come."

"But –" Nobunaga spluttered – "You're ridiculously strong! You must've been on the road for months on end, at least!"

Unable to hold back a smile, Ash glanced up at Larvesta, who had closed her eyes contently. "That's all Larvesta, I'm afraid. I've got nothing to do with it." Larvesta's one-eyed glare made it perfectly well known what she thought of that, and Ash quickly amended his statement. "Well, maybe I give Larvesta directions here and there, but really, it's all her. But aside from your Pinsir, what do you have?"

Nobunaga shrugged. "Well, I've been trying to train up a particularly powerful Caterpie I caught a couple of weeks ago, not that far away from here." He frowned. "She evolved a while ago, but with Metapod being Metapod, I'm sure you can imagine how well that's going for me."

"Damn." Ash winced in sympathy. "I feel sorry for you, honestly."

"Well, now that you've shown me the versatility of String Shot, it might not be so bad." Nobunaga shrugged. "I mean, if Metapod could launch herself up into a tree and then use the momentum to make a club out of her body, she could actually do some damage."

"Yeah, I'm not about to try that with Larvesta." Ash winced again, already imagining the possible deadly outcomes of that situation, not nearly all of them ending in Larvesta's favour. "But yeah, with Metapod being as resilient as it is, it would be a valid tactic, especially if you get a Harden up." He blinked. "Where did you find Pinsir, anyway? And how did you get such an amazing TM on him? I can't imagine that you were rich enough to just buy an Earthquake – they're going for thousands of Pokédollars, I've heard, and that's if you get them cheaply."

Nobunaga suddenly looked quite uncomfortable. "I… Pinsir was my starter." He answered shortly. "He came with the TMs when I got him, a couple of weeks ago." Ash was going to ask further – like how the Pinsir was so damn strong if he'd been given to Nobunaga only a few weeks ago – but Nobunaga shook his head. "It's personal, and I'm not going to elaborate."

"Fair enough." Ash acquiesced, turning back to the path, which looked to be about to re-join the main road. Pulling out his Pokédex again, he quickly checked the GPS-aided map incorporated into the software, and raised an eyebrow at the information displayed on the screen. "We're only a little ways away. Barely another half hour of walking left."

"Yeah." Nobunaga nodded, motioning on ahead – Ash was kind enough not to point out how happy he seemed to be with the change of subject. "This dirt path will meet up with the road in around ten minutes, and it's only a little walk to Pewter from there; you'll see the city walls as soon as we breach the treeline."

"How did you –"

"I had to have some way to get food, didn't I?" Nobunaga smiled a little, before upping his pace. "Come on. If we walk quickly, we'll be able to get to the Pokémon Centre in time for the free dinner they hand out there."

"Free dinner?" Ash' mouth salivated at the mere thought of the first proper meal he'd have since he left Viridian over half a month earlier, and he ran forwards, grabbing Nobunaga by the arm as he passed. "Come on! Dinner!"

"Hey – wait!" Nobunaga cried out in alarm as he was suddenly dragged along, nearly slamming headfirst into a branch Ash had ducked under. "Hold up! Dammit, Ash!"

Ash didn't even pay attention to his new friend's distressed calls or Larvesta's annoyed titters as she was forced to String Shot his shoulder so as to not fall off, the imaginary ringing of a dinner bell clouding up his mind like a Rain Dance to blue skies.

Oo0oO

Barely half an hour later, Ash sat back in his chair, rubbing his stomach comfortably. "Yeah, that's the stuff. Way better than Oran berries, I'll tell you that much."

Nobunaga, who was still eating his – rather small, in Ash' opinion – steak, sweatdropped. "So you drag us here, practically dislocating my shoulder in the process, scare the chef into making you a two ounce steak, wolf it down within ten seconds, and feel that half an hour of rushing was totally worth it, just for that?"

Ash stilled for a second, before nodding and sinking a little further into his chair. "Pretty much, yeah. But to be fair, I haven't eaten meat in nearly three weeks, so I'm allowed to act exorbitant for once."

"'For once?'" Nobunaga echoed with a smirk. "I wonder if, if I call your mother, she'll say the same thing."

"Probably not." Ash grimaced, and Nobunaga snorted around his steak. "Still, it wasn't me that did the scaring – that was all Larvesta's fault."

"True." Nobunaga nodded, swallowing. "Never thought the little bug had it in her, even after the number she did on Pinsir."

"Speaking of." Ash motioned towards the approaching nurse, who was carrying two Pokéballs, with a nod, and Nobunaga turned to look.

"Here you go!" She smiled kindly, depositing the two balls on the table. "They're all healed up, now. Pinsir had some second-degree burns, but a Burn Heal took care of that."

"Thanks, nurse." Nobunaga nodded gratefully, clipping the two balls back on his belt. The nurse merely smiled, before walking back to her counter, where a Chansey was manning the desk and not doing such a good job of it, if the trainer on the other end's frustrated gesturing was any indication.

"Aren't you going to let them out to eat?" Ash asked curiously, but Nobunaga nearly choked on his steak laughing. Ash scowled. "If I'm wrong, just say so. Don't laugh."

Nobunaga held up one hand as he tried to stop himself from choking on his food, coughing loudly. When he'd finally recovered, he sighed, and cut another piece from his steak, which he speared on his fork. "Pinsir is… volatile, at the best of times." He shrugged as he chewed on the meat, swallowing briefly before continuing. "The Pinsir you saw before the battle – that's what he's like when out in the open, on grasslands, or in forests, or whatever. He's rather kind. But when confined in small spaces, like caves, the Pokécentre, or just inside in general, he gets violent, to say the least."

The kid grimaced. "He can release this energy into a battle, and he'll get even more powerful than normally, which is quite helpful in Gym battles, actually – Brock was rather easy to defeat, given his reputation. But if he isn't able to get off, if you will, he'll pick a fight himself, not discriminating between babies, elderly, or a Gym Leader's Pokémon, or even between Pokémon and humans."

"Ah." Ash nodded, glancing at Larvesta, who was munching away on a massive pile of leaves a little ways away. "I have to say, I'm glad Larvesta isn't like that. But what about Metapod? She should be fine."

"Cocoon Pokémon don't need sustenance." Nobunaga explained. "Well, they do, but they don't actually need to eat – at least, not from an extra-bodily source." Ash was just confused, and Nobunaga sighed. "I'm not doing a good job of explaining it, am I?" He asked rhetorically. "Basically, there's a Pokémon inside the cocoon, which, according to scientists, looks like something in between a Caterpie and a Butterfree, in Metapod's case – Kakuna, meanwhile, looks like something in between a Weedle and Beedrill, and Cascoon and Silcoon – well, you can imagine." Ash nodded silently. "The cocoon they're wrapped in – it contains all the stuff needed to survive. So whenever the Pokémon inside the cocoon gets hungry, they just take a bite out of the cocoon."

"But shouldn't Beedrill have hunted them down, then, to get an easy meal?" Ash asked curiously. Nobunaga shook his head.

"Not exactly. The stuff tastes something like tar, for one, according to those professional tester people who check if stuff is fit for human consumption, but it's also got something to do with sustaining a good ecosystem – at least, that's how Professor Birch explained it, in one of those TV cursus things Professors like to do." Nobunaga shrugged, and stuffed another piece of steak in his mouth. "I don't remember all of it, but it was something along the lines of Butterfree ensuring that plants and stuff keep growing and repopulating, and other species feeding off of those plants. Same thing with Dustox and Butterfree."

"And what prevents other species from eating Kakuna shells? Aside from the tar, of course, but I don't think that Pokémon really care about flavour, given some of the flavours of Pokémon food."

"Poisonous substances." Nobunaga explained simply, swallowing a new piece of steak. "A Beedrill's – or Dustox' – poison isn't dangerous in small substances, but during the transition from larvae to whatever, they make so much of the stuff that even a small bite could make a Poison-type sick for days."

"Damn." Ash wrinkled his nose, and reached over to pet a purring Larvesta, who had (finally) finished her meal. "Again, I'm glad that Larvesta's not like that."

Nobunaga snorted. "Doesn't mean that she isn't dangerous. I wouldn't want to touch one of those torches while it's burning."

Ash winced at the thought.

Oo0oO

"So what are you doing today?" Ash asked curiously the next morning, generously lathering his sandwich with peanut butter as he spoke. After having been on the road for weeks on end, he'd given himself a day off before he went on, and Nobunaga had, of course, not complained in the least, picking up a stack of tourist's leaflets from the small rack on the Pokémon Centre's main desk while going down for breakfast that morning to look for something to do.

Nobunaga hummed thoughtfully, sifting through a small leaflet from the – Ash glanced at the cover – Pewter Museum. "I'm hedging between this," He tapped the leaflet on the table nonverbally, "and a trip to the north of Pewter, where – and this was just on the news – a massive herd of Growlithe and Arcanine are terrorising one of the smaller towns up there; see if I can't catch one for myself."

"Isn't the museum way too expensive?" Ash inquired gracefully around his sandwich, sending little bits of sandwich scattering across the table. Nobunaga didn't notice, too absorbed in his leaflet to pay attention to what was happening around him.

"Normally, it is, but not if you have the Boulder Badge, according to this." Nobunaga glanced up at Ash before he went back to the first page, and read out loud; "' _Should you be able to show the attendant a Trainer's License as well as the Boulder Badge upon entering the museum, for one time only, entrance will be free – however, you will have to pay for a second visit. This is to promote-_ ' blah, blah, blah. You get the idea."

Ash pouted. "Lucky bastard."

Nobunaga smirked, before returning to his leaflet. "Well, that's what you get when you have a powerful Pokémon. You'll be up here with me soon, I'm sure."

"You seem to have forgotten that Larvesta beat Pinsir quite handily just yesterday afternoon." Ash pointed out.

"That's just type effectiveness, though." Nobunaga shrugged. "But I suppose my victory over Brock was, too; a single Earthquake was all it took to take care of his Onix."

"And it was his weakest Onix, too, if the Boulder Badge was your first." Ash grinned. Nobunaga paused briefly in his reading, before he sighed.

"You know, I was feeling quite pleased with myself over my easy victory, and now you had to go and ruin that. Great job, Party McPooper."

"I try." Ash' grin grew, before taking one of the leftover leaflets for himself, his sandwich having long since disappeared to the confines of his stomach. "That's another museum leaflet, can't do that – some sort of movie night, no thanks – a cursus on Pokémon type weaknesses and resistances, because everyone needs that, obviously –"

"Hey." Nobunaga interrupted suddenly, sounding quite urgent. Ash glanced over with a raised eyebrow, to find that his friend(?) had abandoned his leaflet, and was instead staring at Ash seriously. "Did you know that Fire-type attacks are good to use against Bug-types?"

Ash gasped in mock bafflement. "No. You can't be serious."

"Oh, but I am." Nobunaga nodded, somehow keeping his mouth from making as much as a twitch. "All Bug-types are naturally attracted by fire, but if they get set on fire, they'll panic, because their shells are too weak to resist such destructive power."

"Wow." Wide-eyed and blinking, Ash' gaze turned towards his plate where he stared, fixated on a non-existent spot. "Dude, that's – that's ground-breaking. That discovery will change the way we think about Pokémon. You should publish that thesi-what'sit. It'll make you world-renowned in, like, less than no time flat."

"I know. And want me to tell you something else?"

"What?"

"Grass-types are weak to fire, too."

" _Dude._ "

Nobunaga snorted at Ash' mock stupefied look, unable to hold back a grin any longer, and Ash chuckled. "All jokes aside, I do need a place to go today, because I'm not about to hang around in the Pokécentre for twelve goddamn hours without doing something else in the meantime."

"You could just pay the fine and go to the museum with me." Nobunaga offered, and Ash blinked.

"Not gonna go for the Growlithe?"

"No, because I just realised that I'm not going to be able to make it there and back again within one day, unless I spend a ton of money to get a Pidgeot Taxi into the near-literal middle of nowhere." Nobunaga shrugged. "Might as well spend some extra time in the museum looking at their samurai collection than spend two hundred bucks and an entire day going back and forth for a single Pokémon, and one that will need a bloody evolutionary stone worth a couple of thousand bucks to boot."

"True." Ash nodded, glancing over the leaflets scattered across the table. "Well, I'm not going to pay fifty bucks that I need for rations and water to look at some stuffy items, so that's out of the window already. Most of this is unattractive, though – a tour through the mall? What the hell were they – hold on, what is this?"

Reaching forwards into the stack, Ash pulled on the small blue corner of something buried beneath other stuff, and blinked when he read the title. "Pewtering into the Pewter Mines? What?"

"I looked it over already." Nobunaga interjected helpfully as Ash started to read. "It's a tour of the old Pewter Mines – you know, the old-old-old ones to the west, the ones they shut down before we were even born due to some cave-in or other. Apparently, it's been cleared for public access, though hardly anyone dares to go in; that's probably the reason why the entrance fee is only ten bucks. Some couple named Jasmine and Jeremy run the place – though I can't imagine how they stay in business, with the amount of people that come through there."

"Yeah, it says so here. _'We're Jasmine and Jeremy, a pair of ex-'_ blah, blah, blah." Ash imitated, tapping a little section of the leaflet, before scanning the next page as Nobunaga scowled a little. "Hm. This says that they think it was a Pupitar that caused the cave-in; seems rather odd when you think about it, really. Pupitar aren't very heavy hitters, and using something like Earthquake while you're underground yourself seems like a stupid thing to do."

"Does it matter any?" Nobunaga asked rhetorically, cutting his own sandwich into two easily edible pieces. "If you want to look at a mine, you can just go to the new mines – there's a tour brochure here, for fifteen bucks. Or you can even go to Mt. Silver, to the massive silver mines they have under there. I'm sure they'd have someone give you a tour if you asked; they've done it in the past, I'm sure."

"Yeah, but going to the new mines will take more than one day – they're way farther away, remember? – and I can't imagine how boring it would be to do something like that without even having the danger of encountering a wild Geodude." Ash smirked, and glanced over the brochure for the 'old-old-old' mines again. "Let's see – I'm going to have to take a Pidgeot there, I think. According to this, there's a Mantine service that passes by, but it doesn't stop there, just flies straight through, and I'm not about to jump down from a flying Pokémon. Well, from a flying anything, really."

"Plus, taking a Mantine is expensive as hell." Nobunaga pointed out, swallowing a bite of his sandwich. "Maybe it's around five bucks if you need to go somewhere popular and easily accessible – just hop on with a few other people – but to take one out for yourself, that'd cost you as much as going to the museum, if not more."

"True." Ash nodded in agreement, wiping some of the crumbs he'd accidently spat across the table earlier off the brochure with a wrinkled nose. "What about it, Larvesta?" He asked, turning to the small Bug-type curiously. "Do you want to go with? Or do I need to leave you with Nobunaga for the day?"

Larvesta shot him a look, as if saying that it should have been obvious from the start, and Ash chuckled. "Of course. Well, come on, we're going to the mart, and then straight to the Pidgeot station – if we leave now, we might still be able to catch the morning rates. That'll save us some money for the journey ahead."

Ash tipped his hat to Nobunaga in a nonverbal goodbye and jogged out of the store, Nobunaga's chuckle and a slightly mocking tip of his helmet following him and Larvesta out of the restaurant and into the open air of Pewter City. Somewhere on a ranch on the outskirts of the city, a Pidgeot was sitting, its feathers stamped all over with his name and the relatively cheap morning rates. However, as Ash reminded himself, he had to get supplies first, before he took off for the old mines.

One cannot go down a path, however short and irrelevant, without sustenance, after all.

Oo0oO

"This should be it, Erasmus." Ash directed, closing his Pokédex and its map with a loud SNAP that he could barely hear over the loud winds. The Pidgeot he'd hired for his trip to the mines rumbled in acknowledgement and started slowing down, circling around their destination several times before flapping his powerful wings once, landing them only slightly uncomfortably onto the solid rock near the entrance of the mines. With a grunt, Ash heaved himself off of the massive bird, and stumbled a couple of steps before he was able to stabilise himself enough to turn back around.

"Thank you." Ash offered, bowing graciously for the prideful Pidgeot that had escorted him to his destination in little less than two hours. Erasmus peered down at him with one large, imperious eye, before nodding surprisingly kindly, and taking off with one single massive beat of his wings that nearly sent Ash sprawling backwards. Coughing and exhaling aggravated sand by the bucketful, he peered at the direction that the Pidgeot had flown off towards, suddenly feeling quite stupid, because how the hell was he supposed to get back?

That was a question for later, however, because the large mouth of the abandoned mines loomed before him invitingly, and he desperately wanted to go in, but first, he needed to do one thing.

"Come on out, Larvesta!"

With a short red flash, Larvesta appeared, sitting on Ash' hat like usual. Ash grinned up at her, before turning to the mouth of the cave, and striding forwards, intent on discovering its deepest, darkest secrets within minutes of entering –

"And where do _you_ think you're going, little guy?"

Flinching in surprise, Ash turned around to face the person that had suddenly appeared, standing right beside him. The man smirked, and stepped to the side, so that he blocked the way to the cave.

"If you want in, kiddo, and I'll need to go with." The man almost purred, sounding quite dangerous. "There's plenty of dangerous things down there – oh yes, very, _very_ dangerous things – and something might happen if I don't come. Something… _bad._ "

"…Who are you? Are you Jeremy?" Ash hedged, backing away slightly from the strange man.

"Jeremy?" The man chuckled, though it was a freezing, soul-chilling kind that made a shiver crawl up Ash' spine. "You may call me 'Jeremy', if you wish. All I am, however, is a man trying to do make an honest stack of money."

"You're the one from the brochure, then? And – and you want to make ten bucks? That's the stack you're referring to, right?" Ash was actively backing away now, though the man was simply following, not allowing him an inch of space.

The smirk still on Jeremy's face grew wider, and significantly scarier. "You could say that, yes." He said smoothly, coming closer to Ash. "Ten bucks, kid. That's all."

"Yeah, right. Look, I'm just gonna go now." Ash chuckled nervously, backing away even further. "I'll just walk back to Pewter. Goodbye, sir."

'Jeremy' chuckled again. "You're not getting away that easily, I'm afraid." His eyes hardened. "Golbat, screech."

A skull-rattling, mind-numbingly loud screech from somewhere behind him was the last thing Ash heard before he passed out, collapsing into a painful heap together with Larvesta on the cold, hard ground.

Oo0oO

" **Oh? Who are you, now?"**

Ash awoke only a little while later, to a loud, deep voice – but it wasn't the awake kind of awake, merely a sort of conscious unconsciousness. It felt like he was floating in darkness, slowly turning in circles in a disorienting manner. The voice snorted.

"' **Conscious unconsciousness'. Not quite how I would put it, but yes. Your body is unconscious, but your mind is awake. I believe humans like to call it lucid dream, though this is most certainly not a dream."**

" _Who are you?"_

The voice quieted at that, seemingly turning introspective for a brief moment before answering. **"…I cannot answer that."**

" _Why not?"_

" **Because I do not know the answer myself."** The voice answered immediately, not missing a beat. **"I suppose that, one of these days, I'll find out, though I doubt that it'll be anytime soon."**

" _But everyone has a name, right?"_

The voice chuckled, though it was grim. **"All humans do, yes. Certainly not all Pokémon."**

" _You're a Pokémon?"_

" **Of course I am. No human psychics I have sensed are powerful enough to pierce the veil of sleep without aid, and most Pokémon have trouble doing so, especially the weaker species."**

" _Why'd you contact me, then?"_

The voice quieted again, though it spoke up again soon after. **"I do not rightly know. Curiosity, perhaps."**

" _Curiosity about what?"_

" **About the aura you seem to have – it's pleasant, but at the same time, my psychic abilities, powerful as they are, seem to have problems reaching you, as though you're something vile they wish to shy away from."**

" _So you're a psychic-type?"_

" **Of course."** The voice scoffed. **"That should have been obvious from the reference to human psychics."**

" _Right. Well, I don't know what you're sensing, but as far as I know, I haven't murdered anyone, stole a priceless artefact, or done some other thing to blacken my aura, if you will."_

" **I do not sense anything wrong; but that might be the problem. I should be sensing things that I do not. Perhaps it's merely the distance – I have not yet had enough chance to experiment with my powers."**

" _Where are you, then?"_

The voice snorted. **"I'm afraid that I have been left in the dark about that myself; the only reason I know it's a long distance in the first place is because my powers barely reach to where you happen to be at – wherever that might be."**

" _Really? Can you describe what it looks like? I got geography in school, I might be able to tell where you are."_

Sounding amused, the voice replied, **"Though I appreciate the offer, I have not yet had the chance to go outside; I heard some of the people around mention that they hate being in the 'HQ', however – and one mentioned preferring the 'Kanto' hideout, wherever that might be."**

If Ash' eyes had been able to widen, they would have. _"That – that means you're in another region!"_

" **And that is shocking why?"**

" _B-because no psychic should be able to reach that far!"_

The voice snorted again. **"I do not exactly fit the boundaries of what ordinary Pokémon should be able to accomplish, especially considering – hold on. A moment, if you would."** Silently, Ash waited for the strange psychic to return, and when it did, it sounded annoyed.

"… **I have been…** _ **asked**_ **to stop practising my psychic powers, so this will be the end of the conversation for now."**

" _Wait! Hold on! Tell me what I should call you, at least! Your species' name, or something!"_

The voice was silent for a brief second, before it answered. **"Currently, I am being called Project Deoxyri, though it seems like that might change in the future."**

" _Project?"_

"… **Goodbye, Ash Ketchum."**

" _Hey, stop that! Stop – stop that. Don't– …don't… put… sleep…"_

Oo0oO

"Good evening."

Ash blinked when he was suddenly thrown back into his body, this time waking up for good. He looked around quickly, scanning his surroundings for anything familiar, only to find himself – backpack, Pokéballs, and Pokédex included, thankfully – lying next to a campfire, an unfamiliar squint-eyed person sitting on a log a little ways away, roasting some sausages over the roaring fire. A large sack full of something Ash wasn't privy to was sitting a little ways away, and a positively gigantic Steelix was curled around the camp, its huge head resting comfortably next to the unknown person.

"Who – who are you?"

The man raised an eyebrow at him, before grinning, and extending a friendly hand. "It's refreshing to introduce myself for once – don't get to do that often, with my job. I'm Brock. Brock Takeshi – but you can call me Brock."

Ash gaped as he weakly accepted the offered hand, his mind trying to comprehend his sudden situation. That explained the Steelix, at least. "A-and how did I, the boring Ash Ketchum, end up in the middle of nowhere with one of the main Gym Leaders of Kanto, roasting sausages over a fire while a Steelix sleeps a few feet away, protecting a vaguely suspicious-looking burlap sack typically used by burglars?"

Brock chuckled, depositing one well-cooked sausage on a plate before handing said plate to Ash, which he accepted with a thankful nod. "I found you during my raid on the Team Rocket hideout a little ways away. It was a pure coincidence that I happened upon it; some guy with a Team Rocket outfit was apparently taking a smoking break, and after a short session of interrogation – nothing grim, I assure you – he revealed there to be a small recruitment centre in the mines.

"I decided to take a small detour, and rounded up the operation – it wasn't too large, and even my Crustle would have been able to take care of it by himself." Brock explained, taking a pack of cigarettes – likely taken from the unfortunate grunt – from within his jacket and lighting one from the fire, though he didn't take a drag. "I found you lying in one of cells, knocked-out, and decided to take you with me." He shrugged, motioning to Steelix with the cigarette clamped between two fingers. "And if you did turn out to be Team Rocket – well, you can imagine what would have happened yourself." He took a long drag from the cigarette, expelling the smoke into a large plume straight upwards. Ash paled a little, nodding.

"Yeah." He cleared his throat uncomfortably, and Brock smirked, depositing a little of his ash next to his log. "Where are the Rockets, then? Shouldn't there be a massive pile waiting to wake up and cause more havoc in the mines?"

Shrugging, Brock took a short drag, absent-mindedly blowing it off to the side. "I had Bastiodon hurry ahead with a large part of the gang on his back. They'll be out at least until they're safely secured within the Pewter police centre. The only reason I didn't go along with him is because I wanted to explore the mine system. Good thing I did, too, or I wouldn't have found you lying around." He grinned a little. "My second Steelix – my father's – was able to take the rest of the grunts within his mouth. A highly uncomfortable ride, and I'm not about to attempt the same thing when I can sit on top instead, but it is as safe as can be, if you'll exclude the potential of accidently getting swallowed."

"Nice." Ash grimaced at the picture, chewing away on his sausage. "And what's with the bag, if I may ask?"

"They're the grunts' Pokémon." Brock shrugged when Ash' eyes widened at the massive number. "I took all the Pokéballs they had, so a large part of the balls will be empty, but I figured that I might as well be better safe than sorry. And there's a ton of Geodude near the bottom, too; my whole point in being over here was to grab Geodude for the trainers starting out in Pewter. Over here, there are so many, even capturing as many as I did wouldn't put a dent in the population, unlike close to Pewter, where even capturing a dozen might upset the highly delicate ecosystem."

Suddenly remembering that he, too, had a Pokémon – but honestly, there had been so much going on that letting Larvesta out of her ball was pretty low on Ash' list of priorities – Ash tapped the button of his Pokémon's Pokéball, which opened with a red flash. Larvesta appeared immediately, buzzing agitatedly, undoubtedly having forced into her ball by 'Jeremy' after his Golbat had knocked them unconscious.

Ash reached over to pet her silently, and Larvesta quieted at his touch, blinking up at him with giant, blue eyes before bowing her head and closing them as she was picked up and held close by Ash, who slowly brushed her fur with the brush from his backpack, which Delia had packed him just for such an occasion.

…Well, perhaps not for an occasion where his Pokémon needed to be calmed down after nearly getting Pokénapped and forced to become a part of Team Rocket or be sold on the Black Market, but that was beside the point.

Brock grinned a little at the sight, letting another puff of smoke grace the skies, and Ash glared at him silently, promising pain should the Gym Leader tease him, which he could tell Brock was about to do. Perhaps wisely, the Takeshi stayed silent, instead choosing to lay himself down on the flat-topped log to stare at the cloudless night skies.

"…You should get some sleep." Brock said eventually, breaking the peaceful silence. Larvesta had already fallen asleep, and was resting quietly next to the fire, her naturally warm body only made even warmer by the hot flames. Ash looked over with bleary eyes from where he was lying on the cold, uncomfortable ground, and blinked, only just now realising how tired he was. "We'll need to be up early tomorrow if we want to get back to Pewter before lunch."

"You're not sleeping, then?" Ash asked, yawning.

Brock chuckled, depositing the stump of his cigarette into the fire. "I'll sleep." He promised. "Just not yet."

"Alright." Ash acquiesced easily, rolling over to lie his head on his soft backpack, feeling much too tired, even after the hours he spent being knocked-out, to bother with setting up his tent, or even getting out his sleeping bag. "G'night, Brock."

"Goodnight, Ash."

Oo0oO

It was early the next morning that they set off again, riding on top of Steelix' massive head at speeds they could never have hoped to reach on foot.

"Shouldn't riding around like this completely destroy the ecosystem?" Ash asked curiously when they ran over a couple of smaller trees in their way and Brock didn't even blink, a few minutes into their trip. "Pokémon's nests getting destroyed, and stuff like that?"

"Not really." Brock shrugged. "If you hadn't noticed, Steelix takes care to avoid anything he can; he goes around trees and vegetation and stuff like that, whenever possible. It's only when he can't that he runs over a bit of vegetation, and even then, he takes care to avoid anything that could house Pokémon." He shrugged again, motioning to one of the larger trees they'd just passed. "For example, bird Pokémon are likely to nest in trees, as are most Bug-types, some Grass-types, and many others. So he avoids those whenever he can. And Flying-types, beside Rock-types, are the only things that are around these parts, aside from the odd Grass-type – but those never build nests. Anywhere."

Ash nodded, suddenly understanding what Steelix was doing. "Right. Because they're plants, right?"

"Or mammals, yes." Brock added, nodding as well, before he paused. "Actually, the Serperior line are reptiles, as are some other species from other regions – but that doesn't really matter while we're in Kanto."

"Why don't the mammals build nests?"

"Because Poison-types will easily be able to find out where they're at and prey upon their entire family, and the Grass-types' natural disadvantage makes it, in most cases, kind of difficult to deal with them." Brock answered, shrugging. "I could go into much more detail than that, but it doesn't really matter, unless you're planning on becoming either a hunter, a ranger, or a doctor, which you don't seem to be interested in, if your extent of knowledge is any indication." Brock smirked. Ash pouted.

Oo0oO

Just like Brock had predicted, they arrived at Pewter a few hours later as it was nearing lunchtime, and unfortunately, Brock's thundering Steelix drew quite a bit of attention.

"Hey, that's Brock!"

"On his Steelix!"

"Wonder what he's been doing?"

"Oh, but if that other Steelix and that Bastiodon were his, too –"

"–Then was he the one responsible for mopping up those Rockets?"

"Hold on, there's someone on there with him!"

"Was that kid responsible?"

"Nah, he's a wimp. Couldn't have done much of anything, I'll bet."

"That's probably what the Rockets in southern Johto thought when Bugsy arrived, before she swept their hideout with her Scizor."

"Bugsy's a guy, actually."

"None of that matters! The point is, those two swept an entire Rocket hideout! That's incredible!"

"…The wimp probably didn't have anything to do with it."

"But what if he did? What if he's another Bugsy?"

"Well, it could be possible, I suppose…"

"If he's a prodigy, then he could have swept the hideout, while Brock just sat there, cleaning up behind him."

"True. In that case, the wimp has to be awesome. Like, incredible."

Ash, by this point, had pulled his hat to cover his eyes, and was trying to hide inside his jacket, though from the sound of Brock's laughter, it wasn't exactly working.

"You'll get used to it soon enough, if you keep getting into situations like this one." The Gym Leader chuckled, waving a little at some passing people he seemed to recognise. "Shall we drop you off at the Pokécentre? I doubt you'll want to remain around to listen to the Rockets being locked up, because you'll probably have to deal with tons of paperwork if you do."

Grimacing, Ash shook his head. "No thanks, I'm good." Suddenly, he blinked, and turned backwards to see if the street had cracked and crumbled like he'd thought it would, only to find spotless asphalt blinking in the sun. "Hey, shouldn't this have screwed with the asphalt? You know, because Steelix is so damn heavy?"

"It's all been reinforced to an nth degree." Brock explained, shrugging – something Ash had noticed he seemed to do a lot. "When the League started asphalting the roads, my grandfather made sure to make it extremely sturdy, so a Golem wouldn't shatter it purely from walking around. I doubt anything short of a rampaging Rhyperior will put a dent in this stuff – unless a Fire-type decides to melt it, but that's another matter entirely. I know for a fact that Jasmine's grandfather did the same thing, and I wouldn't be surprised if the forefathers of the other Steel- and Rock-type Gym Leaders had made sure to do the same."

"Smart." Ash complimented, looking around. "Hey, can you let me off here? It's pretty near, and I know that the Pokécentre's a bit out of the way from the police station, and the Gym."

"Sure." Brock nodded easily, knocking on Steelix' head like it was a door. "Stop, Steelix!" He commanded curtly, and with a loud rumble, Steelix ground to a stop, resting its head on the ground like it knew what its trainer was thinking. "You can slide off now."

"Alright." Ash nodded, pushing himself off of Steelix' massive head, and landing with a short stumble on the ground. "I'll see you, Brock! Expect me in a few months, for my Gym Battle!" He called, waving up at the Gym Leader, who grinned, nodded, and saluted, before Steelix raised its head and started thundering down the street again, quickly leaving Ash in the dust.

With a sigh at how weird his supposed day off had turned out to be – flying for two hours on a haughty and uncomfortable Pidgeot, only to get knocked out by Team Rocket immediately after and getting locked up would make anyone miffed, not to mention that he then spent the rest of the goddamn day knocked out, only to wake up again on the way back after being rescued by a Gym Leader that happened to be passing by, effectively wasting an entire day in the process – he started trudging down the path to the Pokécentre, feeling quite disgruntled at the Rockets about how they'd completely ruined his day off the road.

Still, he'd learned a valuable lesson in the process – there were people out there, people much stronger than himself, who would gladly harm or even kill him and his Pokémon if it meant getting a quick stack of money. So it wasn't too much of a wasted day, just a slightly wasted one.

Sighing again, Ash removed a hand from his pocket to open the door to the Pokémon Centre, intent on getting a quick lunch before moving back on the road for Mt. Moon –

"Hey, Ash! I've been looking for you!"

Only to be stopped by Nobunaga, who was chewing on a sandwich at a table, looking quite pleased with himself. "I've literally been looking all morning, 'cause you didn't come back last night. Where were you?"

"Oh, you know, over at the mining tour." Ash shrugged, sliding into the seat opposite of his new friend. "The entire mining business was a setup from Team Rocket, who ambushed me, knocked me out, and locked me up. Brock then came by and took care of 'em, and saved me from a cell, sending the grunts away on his Bastiodon and second Steelix while he took me with him on his first Steelix. Then, I woke up, ate a sausage with him, slept, woke up again, got taught a little about the north-western ecosystem of Kanto while we rode his Steelix back to Pewter, and arrived in time for lunch." He grinned at Nobunaga's disbelieving deadpan look. "You know, the usual."

Nobunaga stared for a few seconds, before shaking his head, and gulping down a bite of his sandwich. "You know, if you didn't want to say, you could have just said so."

Ash blinked. "No, it's true. That actually happened."

"Sure it did." Nobunaga nodded in agreement, though Ash knew the other boy was merely humouring him.

"Check the papers if you won't believe me!" He insisted. "They'll be full of the incident by tomorrow!"

"Yeah, sure." Nobunaga snorted around his sandwich, which he quickly gulped down with a splash of Sitrus juice. "Tomorrow, when we're away from Pewter, and won't be able to see it."

"But –" Ash protested feebly, "– but I'm not lying!"

"Sure you aren't." His friend rolled his eyes. "And I'm a Watchog."

Suddenly, Ash blinked, and tilted his head, squinting a little. "You kinda look like one, though."

Nobunaga stared for a brief second, then groaned, and facepalmed. "…Shut up. Just – just shut up."

Ash grinned.

Oo0oO

"Incredible, isn't it?"

Ash hummed in agreement, glancing at Nobunaga from where he was staring up at Mt. Moon with Larvesta, which, despite having been on the horizon since leaving Pewter a few days earlier, was a lot more imposing from up close; it was a clear day, without clouds in sight, and the quite literally snow-white peak loomed at an incredible two-and-a-half miles as one of the highest mountains on the To continent.

"Why's it called Mount Moon, though?" Ash asked curiously, and Nobunaga quickly leafed through his little guide book, trying to find the correct entry.

"Ah, here it says. Apparently, a meteorite crashed into it and dug itself way down into the deepest levels, back during the Era of the Warring Clans." Nobunaga explained, referring to when Kanto and Johto didn't exist yet, and the entire continent was instead split up in factions, ruled by clans such as the Wataru from Johto, and the ninjas of Kyō, from eastern Kanto. "The Yomi Clan, who ruled the area around Mt. Moon, thought that it was a shard of the moon, and started worshipping it as their god, sort of. Named the entire mountain after the thing. When Kanto became Kanto, one of the things the Yomi Clan asked for during the negotiations to get them to join was to keep the name of their 'holy mountain', despite the fact that the name Mt. Meteor might have been more appropriate."

"Doesn't sound as good, though." Ash pointed out, but Nobunaga merely shrugged.

"Didn't stop the guys in Hoenn."

"I think you'll find that they named that particular area Meteor Falls, which, if you ask anyone, sounds a lot better than Mt. Meteor." A new voice interjected, and Ash and Nobunaga whirled around to face a young, blonde scientist, who shoved his glasses up his nose with a small, superior smile. Larvesta tittered anxiously at her master's sudden action, but didn't move from her usual perch upon Ash' hat. "Plus, who says it isn't a shard of the moon?"

"This guidebook does." Nobunaga deadpanned, shoving the small book in the scientist's face, who scanned over the page it was showing with a delicate quirked eyebrow. "Why are you here, anyway? Doing your monthly count of how many individual Zubat there are in Mt. Moon?"

"No, I'm afraid not." The scientist chuckled, sounding almost mocking as he shoved the guidebook down and away from his face with a dainty hand. "I'm here to study the Clefairy and Clefable. They dwell near the upper levels, near where I, with the help of a couple of other scientists, have calculated the Moon Stone to be. There are, of course, other calculations, most of which project the Stone to be somewhere in the lowest levels – but they're incorrect, of course." He sniffed, pushing his glasses farther up his nose in what seemed to be a habit of some sort. "I was only out to get some equipment – not that that is any of your business, of course."

Nobunaga gave the rather narcissistic scientist a calculating look. "If you're able to go near the upper levels, you must be pretty strong. Are you up for a battle?"

The scientist frowned. "…Very well. Though, if we must persist in such uncouth activities –" Ash fought the urge to roll his eyes – "Shall you at least tell me your name?"

"Oda Nobunaga." Nobunaga grinned, unclipping one of his Pokéballs from his belt. "And you are?"

The scientist cast a disdainful eye over his adversary and his friend, and turned up his nose, getting out is own Pokéball in the process. "I don't think you really need to know that, Mr. Oda. After all, it has never appealed to me to converse in an intelligent manner with a lesser species, as attractive as some of my colleagues might make it out to be – even now, I find myself in need of reducing my usual vocabulary down to a standard a ten-year-old me would scoff at; I do not wish to dare to find out what would happen if I were to find myself in need of actively pursuing a halfway difficult subject with one as mentally deficient as yourself." He sneered a little, throwing out his Pokéball. "Take care of these Neanderthals, Porygon-Z. And do make it quick."

The Pokémon that came out of its ball made Ash silently question how such a weak-looking thing had, in the hands of the Scientist, been able to take out Oak's entire security system. While he'd heard of Porygon and its evolutions before, he'd never actually seen Porygon-2 and Porygon-Z, due to the exceedingly rare items needed for their evolution – or upgrade, because technically, they were data given a mind and physical form. Simply put, it was a balloon animal. A balloon animal that floated in mid-air, silently blinking at them like a Banette-possessed child's doll, looking about as dangerous as a day-old Dratini.

Nobunaga scowled, and tapped the release button on his own Pokéball, sending Pinsir, who seemed to have fully recovered from Larvesta's assault two days earlier, out onto the field. The bug-type roared an enthusiastic greeting, clacking his pincers with fervour, and Ash chuckled. Nobunaga's scowl deepened.

"Now is not the time, Pinsir!" He called out. "This arrogant asshole needs to be taken down a peg, and you're going to be the one to do it!"

Pinsir, suddenly understanding the situation, reared his head and roared, a loud, grating noise that made Ash grimace, Larvesta titter in annoyance, and sent the Porygon-Z careening back slightly; the scientist on the other side of the field sent Pinsir an annoyed look, and started inspecting his fingernails for dirt, completely ignoring the other trainers. "Porygon, Psycho Cut. Psyshock version, of course."

Porygon-Z… made noise in agreement – it was a weird, mechanical beeping that Ash couldn't really make heads or tails of – and started charging power, releasing it in a thin, pale pink beam reminiscent of a scythe's blade in short order, set to slice Pinsir in two – or at least severely harm him, should he not do something about it.

"Pinsir, Protect!" Nobunaga snapped immediately, and a dome-like shield appeared around Pinsir, blocking the slash head on. "Now, Brick Break!" Pinsir roared again, shooting forwards as his shield dispersed with speed Ash hadn't expected to see; the scientist merely sniffed, however, and pushed his glasses a little farther up his nose.

"Porygon, float a little higher." And the Porygon-Z did, zooming up only a little before Pinsir was upon him; but that was all that was needed, because, with the added height, Pinsir was unable to get to him, and was left Brick Breaking thin air. "Lock-On, then Zap Cannon."

"Smack Down!" Just as Porygon-Z had locked in on Pinsir and was set to electrocute the Bug-type, Pinsir set his pincers into the ground, coming up with a massive boulder, ripped straight from the ground; and with a grin unseen by the humans and a snap of his pincers, the boulder was ripped to pieces. Chunks of rock of various sizes fell to the ground around him with a loud rumble, completely useless, as one single well-placed piece flew up into the air and smacked Porygon-Z in the face, sending the light-weight balloon crashing down to the ground, where it was forced to release its Zap Cannon into the ground to get rid of the now useless built-up electricity.

The scientist scowled and finally started paying attention to the battle, now that his Pokémon was pinned under a massive boulder that would undoubtedly knock it out within half a minute, if Pinsir didn't act up earlier. "Psychic on the boulder! Send it at the Pinsir! Then Tri-Attack, Fire!"

Nobunaga scowled as well, even as Pinsir broke the boulder into pieces with a Brick Break of his own volition; due to the Porygon line being made up out of pure data, they had the ability to change parts of their own make-up, to the point of changing types, and, indeed, directing moves to go just as they pleased where they would otherwise be utterly unpredictable. And if fire got to Pinsir, then he would have lost the battle, no contest. "Submission-Giga Impact! Then Thrash, when you have it in a hold!"

Pinsir roared in agreement and sprinted forwards, even as Ash' eyes widened at the ludicrously sacrificial combo; Giga Impact, if it hit, caused the user to become fatigued due to the sheer amount of power required, to the point where even simple attacks were difficult to perform, and Submission gave the opponent plenty of time to strike, even whilst being attacked, as such almost always grievously harming the user in the process. Thrash was basically the same thing, an all-out offensive without any thought left over for defence; however, if it worked, then Nobunaga would win the match immediately.

However, before Pinsir could even reach the recovering Porygon-Z, it was recalled by its trainer, who was scowling deeply. Pinsir was left standing confusedly where his target had been lying earlier, looking quite lost, and Ash and Nobunaga both blinked at the sudden, unexpected move. "Whilst I normally would not go as far as to accuse someone of cheating, especially in an unofficial match, I'm afraid I'm going to have to cross that line now, because what you just did was basically cheating, and even illegal in some places, such as Kalos and Hoenn."

The scientist sniffed, and pushed his glasses up his nose, stalking past Pinsir and his two human adversaries with a disdainful glance. "Such tactics are crude to the extreme, and I shall not deign your brutish selves with my presence for any longer. By cheating, you have forfeited the match, and so I come out of this conflict the winner – though I would have, either way, I simply have no wish to witness such a menace any longer than I have to. Have a… _pleasant_ day, primates."

For a few moments after the scientist had left, the clearing was filled with silence, only broken by Pinsir's laborious breathing, the chirping of bird Pokémon from the surrounding forest, and the worried tittering of Larvesta, who, being only little more than two months old, didn't completely understand why everyone had fallen silent. Then, Ash finally asked what had been on his mind since the start of the match, because something didn't add up to him. "If Pinsir is that strong – if he's able to go toe to toe with such a strong Porygon-Z without much trouble – then why the hell did Larvesta win?"

Nobunaga sighed like he'd already known this was coming, and recalled Pinsir, clipping his Pokéball to his belt. "Pinsir is afraid of fire." He said shortly, turning back towards the path leading up to Mt. Moon, which he started trudging down, quickly followed by Ash, and by proxy Larvesta. "He was… severely harmed by it, several months before I got him. It's a phobia of his. That's why I made the decision to use such a self-sacrificial move combo."

"A forest fire?" Ash asked curiously, but Nobunaga shook his head.

"A Pokémon battle." Before Ash had the chance to ask further, Nobunaga quickly changed the subject, motioning on ahead to the mountain. "You're the one with the map – how much further is Mt. Moon's entrance?"

With a frown and a slight sigh and another line of possible information into his friend's past busted, Ash flipped open his Pokédex, checking the small map for their location. A small dot was moving along the road to Mt. Moon, and Ash frowned at its location, realising that they hadn't come nearly as close to Mt. Moon as he'd believed. "We're nearly halfway there." Ash answered, glancing up at the time, which was slowly ticking its way to 09:28 P.M.. "It's already nearly half past nine – but the sun doesn't even seem to be going down."

"It's summer." Nobunaga reminded Ash unnecessarily. "And we're way up in northern Kanto, much nearer to the equator than what you're undoubtedly used to from southern Kanto."

"True." Ash acknowledged, checking his Pokédex again. "We should probably go about setting up camp; if we sleep around ten o'clock, we should be up and about by seven tomorrow. We'll make it to Mt. Moon before dinner, then."

"Alright." Nobunaga nodded easily, motioning at the surrounding forest, where it would be less troublesome to camp than out in the middle of the road, where every single passing traveller would want to talk, if not battle. "Lead the way, Passepartout. Following your lead, we might still be home for Christmas."

Ash scowled, though it was more of a disguised smile than anything. "Sure, Fogg. As long as you don't fire me for making your shaving water two degrees too hot."

"I'll have you know that such a thing can make or break a man's look." Nobunaga declared sagely. "Why, if I were to get a penny for every time a shave with cold water has given me a bad look –"

"Then you'd be just as broke as you are now." Ash deadpanned, ducking under a tree. "Come on, Larvesta. Let's see if we can't find our lord and master a clearing."

Larvesta was just confused.

Oo0oO

"So this is basically Mt. Moon."

"It is."

Nobunaga gulped behind the hand that was scratching his neck nervously. "It's… dark."

Ash rolled his eyes, comfortably trudging down the wide tunnel, which had been dug by Pokémon millennia earlier and was even now still being explored by too-curious humans, holding his Larvesta-lit torch out in front of him so as to not trip over his own feet. "Honestly, I never thought that the one thing that the great Toian Samurai warlord was afraid of would be the dark. We only went down a single side-tunnel!" He said, exasperated. "Just because this isn't lit all over –"

"Yeah, but look at all those holes and crevices!" Nobunaga whimpered, motioning to the various side-tunnels that led off to the deeper parts of Mt. Moon in an intricate system of tunnels nobody had bothered to map out yet. "Who knows what could be hiding in there! A Rhyperior, out for blood! Maybe a Steelix, ready to gobble us up for an afternoon snack!"

"Nearly all Rock- and Ground-types eat minerals." Ash pointed out dully, moving around a particularly low-hanging stalactite. "And the most you'll find in these levels are weak Zubat and Geodude. I was planning to go down a level in search for a powerful Zubat, but with how you're acting now, I don't think that'll be possible."

"There's plenty scary things around here, I do _not_ need the added scare of going down to more powerful Pokémon!" Nobunaga claimed, sounding quite shrill to Ash' ears. Larvesta tittered in annoyance, shooting Nobunaga a rather cute glare. "Or do I need to remind you that a single Geodude is more than enough to send us all running for cover, because nothing can harm it?"

"You do realise that a single Brick Break from Pinsir would send it flying, right?" Ash noted, but was ignored in favour of a small, undoubtedly newly hatched Zubat that zipped past them, which, of course, made Nobunaga jump and whimper.

"Oh no." He whimpered, clasping Pinsir's Pokéball tightly enough that Ash was halfway expecting it to shatter any second. "I don't think my little Oda heart can take much more of this…"

Ash sighed. "Look, we're not leaving this place for the main tunnels unless I find a significantly powerful Zubat. And because you're not letting us go down a level," Nobunaga's body shook at the mere thought, "we're going to have to spend days looking for one, unless we happen to luck out and find one before then."

"Why can't you just take one of the other Zubat?" Nobunaga almost whined, eyes darting around in paranoia. "There's plenty of them around here – entire colonies –"

"Because grabbing just any Zubat will force me to take a weak one, which I don't need, with the Cerulean Gym Battle coming up." Ash explained patiently, swinging his torch around to scare off a small colony of Zubat that had chosen to investigate the light. Nobunaga whimpered at the sight. "We're just going to be visiting a couple of colonies – the heads of the colonies will probably be powerful enough."

"But how do you know you've found a strong one? How do you know one of the other ones isn't really strong?"

"The larger a Zubat is, the closer they are to evolution." Ash sighed. "So I'm looking for a large Zubat. Obviously."

"These are all plenty large to me." Nobunaga muttered anxiously, stepping a little closer to Ash. "There! What about that one!"

Ash sighed and turned to look, only to find a positively tiny Zubat hanging from a stalactite a little ways above. "That one's days old." He said bluntly. "If he's ready to evolve, I'll eat my hat."

"Okay, there! What about that!" Nobunaga pointed at another small Zubat that was fluttering around, and Ash sighed.

"Look, I appreciate that you're trying to help, but your helping isn't really helping any."

Nobunaga, in the middle of pointing out a third small Zubat, sighed, and hung his head dejectedly. "Fine." He muttered, before jumping again at the noise of a Zubat that zipped past.

"I hate this place." He whimpered.

Oo0oO

"We've been in this place for _three days_ , Ash!" Nobunaga sighed two uncomfortable… sessions of sleep later – in places where there wasn't any light or way of finding out which time of day it was, there wasn't really something like 'Day' or 'Night', because even the Pokédex' timer relied on GPS to keep track of time – and, though Nobunaga had stopped jumping at every shadow that moved, he'd resorted to complaining instead; not all that much of an improvement, if you asked Ash.

"I know we have." Ash nodded, calmly moving along the dark tunnel. They'd long since run out of wood to burn for light, and were instead relying on Larvesta to cast light every now and then with a small ember; exhausting, but it worked.

"Then _why can't we just leave?_ " Nobunaga stressed, jumping in front of Ash. Naturally since neither of the two could see a thing and relied on sound to find each other's location, Ash didn't see him, and they bumped into each other, falling to the ground in a painful heap.

"Goddammit, Nobunaga!" Ash cursed, feeling ready to throw a punch at his friend. "Would you stop doing that?"

"If we can leave, then yeah!" Nobunaga retorted, jumping upright again. Ash followed soon after, and, with a burst of fire from Larvesta to find the right way, they trotted off again, further down the long and scary hallway. "I really don't see why some of those other Zubat weren't good enough for you. There were some pretty large ones back there, a colony or two ago –"

"Pretty large ones, but nothing special, which I need, if I'm going to defeat the Three Sisters with a single Pokémon." Ash frowned.

"Then just train it up a little!" Nobunaga begged, and though he couldn't see him, Ash felt the other boy had clasped his hands in front of him, and had nearly fallen to his knees. "Please! I want to get out of this damn cave! I'm slowly going crazy!"

Ash paused briefly, and Larvesta shot off an ember to make sure that Nobunaga wouldn't run into them. Then, he sighed, and hung his head in defeat. "Fine." He grumbled, moving on again. "The next colony we find, I'm catching a Zubat."

"Yes!" Nobunaga crowed in victory, and when Larvesta blew another ember, Ash saw that he'd fallen to his knees and was raising his hands skyward, like it was a godsend that Ash had finally complied. "Thank you, Arceus! Thank you, for this great blessing you've given me! This is the greatest day of my – ow!"

Ash rolled his eyes and stuck his hand back in his pocket from where he'd bonked Nobunaga on the head. "Stop being so melodramatic and come on. I want to go to Cerulean too, you know."

"Doesn't mean you have to be violent." Nobunaga grumbled, shuffling on after Ash while rubbing his painful head. "You could've been kind about it, but no – first you torture me with days of darkness, and then you start hitting me –"

"Watch out!" Ash suddenly shouted, pulling his friend down to evade the Pokémon that had suddenly shot through the darkness right where Nobunaga's head had been seconds earlier. Nobunaga cursed in reply as he felt the displacement of air ruffle his hair, and glanced up only to find a Zubat – a Zubat? – barrelling down at them from above, looking ready to tear out their eyes.

"What about this one?" Nobunaga screamed shrilly, ducking into a small alcove to evade another run. "I don't think – fucking hell! – it's all that weak, compared to – would you fuck off! – the others we've run across – dammit, you bloody bat! Attack Ash, would you?"

Ash was standing a little ways away, contemplating quietly while Larvesta kept the entire area bathed in light with a lit torch. "I think this is the one, Larvesta." He mumbled, grinning as the Zubat dove after Nobunaga again, nearly latching onto his head before he managed to dodge the claws. "Get its attention with a String Shot, or Ember, or something."

Larvesta didn't reply verbally; instead, she focused briefly before letting loose a big stream of embers at the Zubat, which had to swerve to avoid them. It looked around quickly for the source of the flames, only to find Larvesta sitting on Ash' hat, torch flaming brightly. Flying away from the cowering Nobunaga and closer to Ash and Larvesta, the Zubat called out in a clear challenge, and Ash grinned, glancing up at his Pokémon. "Ready, girl? Start with a String shot!"

With a silent nod, Larvesta jumped off of Ash and floated down to the ground, settling down comfortably only for a brief second before she fired off a long string, trying to wrap the Poison-type up for an easy win. Zubat didn't give up so easily, however; instead, it cut straight through the strings with glowing wings, and was straight on course for Larvesta until the Bug-type latched onto a wall with a String Shot and shot off, zooming straight past the surprised Zubat to land on the floor a little ways away, spitting Embers at the Zubat before Ash even got the chance to tell her to do so.

Zubat screeched in alarm and, unable to evade the stream completely, tried to cut through the fire with another Wing Attack, only to get severely burnt and lit on fire in the process. Naturally, it screamed.

The sound was _not_ a nice one, and Ash immediately flinched, trying to cover his painful ears with his hands to block out the noise. It didn't work at all, and Ash grit his teeth as the grating, ear-bleeding screeches rattled his skull for what felt like an entire hour, until he was ready to curl up in a ball on the floor and cry.

Then, it was over, and Ash looked up from where he'd fallen to his knees without even realising it, to find the blackened form of Zubat lying a few feet away, still breathing comfortably, but clearly knocked out. Larvesta was still awake, but barely; the screeches had apparently hurt her much more than they had Ash, and it was all she could do to still keep a small flame going to ensure her trainer didn't squish her or Zubat on accident. With a slight, tired smile, Ash grabbed one of the empty Pokéballs attached to his belt and chucked it at the still form of Zubat, not having to look to hear the soft 'ding!' of a successful capture. Instead, he turned to Larvesta, who was looking up at Ash with one bleary eye, and Ash smiled proudly.

"You did great, Larvesta." He whispered, reaching over to stroke her fur. "Absolutely incredible. I couldn't have been more proud." Larvesta managed a soft, tired titter as reply, before she passed out, taking the light with her.

Just as Ash returned his first Pokémon, however, Nobunaga came crawling out from the alcove he'd been hiding under, the sounds of shuffling clothes being the only reason Ash even knew it was happening. They were both silent for a short moment, revelling in the sudden peace and quiet, before Nobunaga suddenly spoke up, sounding confused.

"Hey Ash, did you pick up Zubat's Pokéball?"

Ash blinked, taking in the fact that all possible sources of light were now gone, and there was one small ball to find, lying somewhere in the giant expanse of the tunnel without any clues as to its location.

"…Fuck."

Oo0oO

"We've arrived, Murkrow."

Murkrow cawed, hopping from one leg to another from his place atop the boat's bow, and his trainer smirked, reaching over with one pale hand to ruffle his head-feathers. "It is unfortunate, really – I had wanted your first time in Kanto to be on a vacation, not because of a crisis. But no matter. The League couldn't exactly force Caitlin out of bed to deal with the problem, could they?"

Rather affronted, Murkrow cawed again, because yes, that was, in fact, quite possible, but his trainer ignored him, instead staring back out to sea, and towards the approaching land. His lips quirked upwards into a slight smile, a fond one, which Murkrow had not seen upon his trainer in years, and he leaned forwards, bracing his hands against the railing as his long scarf flapped erratically behind him in the wind. "This brings back so many memories, Murkrow – memories like you wouldn't believe. I should tell you about them sometime – it'll be sure to bring us a good laugh, at least."

Suddenly, he shook himself, a single lock of hair falling over the bridge of his nose and past his eye, down to his cheekbone. He didn't pay it any mind. "It matters not. For right now, memories are the last thing we need, especially since we're going to be hunting down one of the most dangerous people Unova has produced over the last century."

Slowly, a nearly malicious smirk started to make its way across his face, and Murkrow blinked in surprise at the change.

"Run away, little scientist." He purred, smirk growing. "Run away, but don't be surprised when we're there when you finally take a rest. You can't get away from the dark, especially if you're its prey, and you, Colress, are my prey. So run, but beware, for behind every corner, in every shadow, every time you turn your back – I'll be watching."

Murkrow sweatdropped.

* * *

 _ **Chapter notes:**_

 _ **I tried to write Ash' capture and the subsequent raid out in full, but it pretty much bummed out, resulting in a writer's block lasting three weeks. In the end, I just decided to delete it all, and do it like I did. It resulted in a slightly shorter chapter, but also in a side-plot that I previously hadn't yet planned, so I'm not that mad.**_

 _ **In case anyone was wondering, falling asleep gives you something called REM (or Rapid Eye Movement) sleep, which is what gives you rest. Getting clubbed/screeched/whatever-ed to unconsciousness, as far as I know, doesn't give you this, thus not allowing you to get a good rest. Same with drinking yourself unconscious, actually.**_

 _ **The To continent is basically the continent where Kanto and Johto are located. As far as I know – and this is from using a very, very vague online Japanese dictionary – To is also the name for a promoted pawn in chess, which kinda fits with the 'Kanto is important' theme. The south-eastern side of Sinnoh connects with this, and Sinnoh itself is part of another (currently unnamed) continent that has Unova and Kalos, as well. Hoenn just drifts around somewhere, I suppose.**_

 _ **Unlike with Colress, I'm not going to outright state who that was, just now, but I've dropped some pretty massive hints, and you should be able to glean who it is from that. And if you think you've figured it out, don't leave it in a review, please. Don't spoil it for the people that haven't figured it out. PM me if you NEED to have confirmation, but don't spoil it for the rest.**_

 _ **On the Chapter's Title; 'De la terre à la lune' was a novel by Jules Verne, which, when translated, reads 'From the earth to the moon'. Considering mines, Pewter City, and Mt. Moon, I thought it was rather appropriate – the references to Around the world in Eighty Days played a part, too.**_

 _ **And that's it for this time, I suppose. So I'll see you all next month. Hopefully. If nothing horrible happens to me in the meantime.**_

 _ **-The Baron**_


	3. Fuck my life

**Fuck my life.**

 **I'm going to be honest, right from the start – Phoenix is going on HIATUS. This isn't because I've lost interest in the fic, or whatever, and it's certainly not abandoned, but – this shit's complicated.**

 **First off, writing this is HARD. Might not seem so at first glance, but before this, I've always worked on stuff like Harry Potter, and Lord of the Rings, where I have guidelines I can use – events all over the place and a perfectly set universe for me to grab from – to construct my fic. With Pokémon, I don't, and this is hard on a whole other level.**

 **Secondly – and here comes some whiny personal bullshit – my father ran away from us with another woman a couple months ago, and since we don't make enough money to pay off the rent of two houses at once, my mother and I are moving to my grandparents' place, who have enough space to hold four people and have a house that's already been paid off in full. Sadly, this comes with a ton of moving, and breaking down closets and setting them back up, and painting, and wallpaper-ing, and stuff like that.**

 **And since I'm the only goddamn male in the house with a back that isn't about to collapse from carrying a stack of paper, I'm having to do all the heavy work, leaving me with precious little time to write. I can easily slap together a chapter of Harry Potter within a day, but believe me when I say that this shit takes fucking time, time like I don't have.**

 **Basically, I can't keep up with my own speed, and the amount of writer's blocks I'm getting from this shit is kinda pissing me off. So, for the moment, I've decided to put this on hiatus, and turn my attention back on my Harry Potter fic, since I can at least do something with that other than sit here and whine about the fact that I don't know how to fucking proceed.**

 **That's all I was going to say. I'm sorry if any of you are particularly disappointed about this, and I will return, I promise, just not anytime soon.**

 **-The Baron, out.**


End file.
